After the Rain
by My.Name.Is.Mudd
Summary: AU, sort of. Now an adult, Happy Lowman's daughter Everett must learn how to adult. But what is the proper way to adult, when you've been raised by a pack of wild Sons? How far will she go to touch her ultimate dream? Seeing who raised her, one would say, pretty far. -Much more into the SOA universe than Stars was, M for lang/violence. On Hiatus. Convince me to keep writing lol.
1. Chapter 1

**Ahoi, there! I'm bacccck!**

 **Ok, so before we even start, there's a few things I wanna say. First off, thank you so much for reading Stars, it really made me proud, to not only have finished a project, but having so many hits and reviews on it. It blew me away! Thank you, thank you! And if you haven't read Stars, I suggest you go and do so, right la! (No, it's not necessary to have read it to understand this one, but it's always a good thing to know the history!)**

 **So. My second point is super simple. I did not feel like creating a whole new cast of characters right before I started writing, so I have decided to basically use the Sons of Anarchy Charming chapter characters, with French names. So Filip "Chibs" Telfort will become Philippe Lefort, Jax Teller becomes Jacques Tellier, and so on. Shouldn't be so hard to figure out. There will be some made up faces, but the main SOA Marseille Charter is just the Charming Charter with changed names. Not the same club in history, just the same likenesses.**

 **Ok, that's it. On with the show!**

 **Oh, no wait! I've decided to do something similar to 30 chaps in 30 days, but different. There will be two "seasons" to the story, each with fifteen chapters, posted over the course of two months. So Season one in June, season two in July. That's one update every two days! I own my own characters, Kurt Sutter owns the rest!**

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She was disoriented as she woke up in strange arms. The morning was gray and lazy, she brushed her dirty blond hair off her face, reached to look at the boxy alarm clock on the nightstand, seven twelve. Her feet were tangled in his, his arm locked around her torso, thanks, dude, she now had a kink in her back from not sleeping straight.

He had a grunt as she shoved him off, when she sat on the edge of the narrow bed, and looked out the window into Washington Lake, it came back to her. Seattle. The late night phone call, the haste to catch a flight, all the while knowing she was crying wolf again. The responsibilities that weren't even hers anymore, had they ever been hers in the first place. This childish, girlish bedroom that was never hers and that she now hated with a passion. She stood, one hand gripped on the holey knitted blanket that she tossed around her back like a vest, she pulled it closer, she was tall for a girl, her mom always said so, she was almost as tall as her father. So the blanket was not long enough to wrap all around, her legs were bare as she pushed the double door leading to the tiny private balcony open, the breeze hit her in the face, sending her hair flying wildly around her head. It was raining, rain was so depressing.

She stayed there until she heard a motorcycle downstairs, just one, it made her smile, the door stayed open as she hurried inside, she tossed the blanket on the bed, peeled her shirt off and foraged her bag for a bra and some panties, she kicked the guy in the ass as she hopped into her skinny jeans.

-Hey. Hey! Get the fuck out.

-Fuck off.

-Fuck you, then!

She looked for a shirt, a decent one, but she could not find, so she just grabbed her leather jacket and her helmet from the high back chair that was in the room, tossed the jacket on and pulled her hair out of the collar, she zipped as she reached the kitchen.

God this was depressing. She hated coming here.

-Ra-inh, Hu-et.

There was an episode of the Simpsons, most possibly her favorite, where Bart and Lisa shelter this homeless heroin junkie names Hettie, and Hettie made a description about her father's face after he got shot in the face. A puzzle that you need to move the pieces around to solve. Her birth mother's face looked something like that. An outside to match her insides.

Everett could not hide the disdain that rose to her face for the shell of a woman sitting in front of her, it was so early in the morning, and she was already wasting it away with a packet of coke. She bites the inside of her lips to keep quiet, before violently shoving the wheelchair away, it falls sideways, the petite woman in it hoots and hollers as she falls and tumbles, screams at the top of her lungs when she sees Everett grabbing the cocaine and dumping it in the sink, runs the water over, before starting to over turn the kitchen, screaming louder with her throaty and gravelly voice.

-I'm done! I'm done busting my fucking ass to send you junkie bitch to rehab! Where's it? Huh? Where's the rest?

She found a few pills in the bread box that she heeled with her bare foot before throwing some water on top, on the floor, tossed plates to the ground over it, in her search for more drugs.

'Hu-et! Hu-et!" the woman kept on screaming, along with some other unintelligible bullshit Everett wasn't even hearing, she went into the living room, found two more baggies of cocaine, one under the coffee table, the other in the battery compartment of the TV clicker. They were flushed down the sink too, before she went to rip the main bedroom to shreds, using her knife to rip cushions. She just had enough. She found heroin in the bedroom and a crack pipe in the bathroom, she was screeching at the top of her lung, until someone caught her. She tried to fight off, but this guy knew her like a brother, he avoided her elbows flying back rather easily.

-Evie. Stop. You know the bitch ain't worth it. Come on.

She stopped fighting, wiped her nose and huffed, brushed her tangled hair back, no idea how Kenny Winston had managed his way up here, but she would not fight him, he was much bigger than her. She sucker her teeth, caught her breath, before hurling the wheelchair towards the living room, where it broke the TV and coffee table both.

-I fuckin' hate you. Dad should have murdered you when he had the chance. Don't ever call me again. Cause I'll come, and I'll finish what he started. You fucking waste of space.

Kenny pulled and shoved her towards the lobby, went to grab her backpack as she put her boots and brought her downstairs, and onto his motorcycle that had belonged to his father, as he was driving, she checked her phone. Yup, she had totally drunk-dialed then texted Kenny at one in the morning, at her drunkest point, and begged to be taken back home.

She leaned against his back. They'd hadn't grown up together, but every summer, Kenny and his sister would visit for a week, until about six years ago. When they had all gotten too old for that sleepover shit. And he was her best friend.

After half an hour, Kenny stopped at a cafe out of the city, a little diner like the ones you see on TV, held the door for her, let her pick a table, she looked rough.

-How many hours did you sleep since you got here?

-Less than ten

-You're slipping.

-I hate it here, you know it.

-Where do you want to be?

She shrugged, anywhere but here. The big, fat waitress come to serve them coffee with a jovial smile, listed the specials before handing them menus and walking away, they both giggled after looking at one another. Kenny leaned towards her over the steaming hot coffees, and whispered dramatically.

-Evie, do you think she's onto us?

-You're not supposed to use our real names!

-Shit! I mean, Bonnie! Do you think she's onto us?

-I don't know, Clyde! Perhaps we should just keep on trucking!

-But if we leave right now, th...

-They'll really be onto us! Stop whisperin'!

It felt good to laugh so hard, she hadn't in a while. As brief as were the six months she had lived in Charming, she had always felt more at home with the people there than anywhere else. Kenny gives her a long hard look over his coffee cup, before having a sigh of contempt.

-I see the ring is gone. Dan gone with it?

She rubs her fingers against her left palm, before setting her grey eyes on her fingers where a ring sat for two years, she had a small smile. Kenny will probably say "I tol' you SO!", as always.

-I'm dad. Not built for normal.

-You're an international fugitive's daughter, you're not built for normal!

-Easy, international... I'm pretty sure they forgot about him. It's been sixteen years.

-Oh, no. No one's forgotten the bloodbath he left behind. But worry not, sister, as his tales are still told.

-Shut up!

-Seriously. Dan?

-Fuck Dan. He was a fucking square and a drag. And the sex wasn't even that good.

-So now what?

-I'm going back to France. Fuck her, I'm done with the bullshit.

-You should have been done fifteen years ago. So, you're going back to work?

Everett raised en eyebrow as he opened the menu and peered at what he could order, he knew damn well the answer to that, her previous declarations had been nothing short of an atomic bomb in the Sons of Anarchy's little universe.

-Really, Kenny?

-What?

She shook her head and scoffed at his innocent question, if she could reach across the table and slap him, she would.

-No I'm not going back to work, you fucking dimwit. I'd rather become that slag then go back to being a god damn accountant.

-So what are you gonna do?

She cocked her head and smiled, looking at the patches on his kutte, he'd been wearing them proudly for over ten years, now. He looked down, pretended to dust them off, one day she would hurt him. He was too goofy for his own good.

-You wanna hear it for yourself?

-I'd like to hear if it's true.

He sustained her gaze for a long moment, before she took her first sip of coffee, the waitress came over to take their order, not that Everett cared.

-I'm going to become the first ever woman to be a full patch member of the Sons of Anarchy, Kenny. No matter what it takes.

The waitress that had just reached their table swiftly turned back around to leave them along, it made Kenny laugh, he drowned it in his coffee.

-Well it's about fucking time, if you ask me, Everett.


	2. Burn, bitch, burn

Ah! I'm so sorry! I forgot to post the update! Well, without further a due! All Kurt Sutter characters belong to Kurt Sutter, and all original characters belong to me. Read and review!

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She dropped the mail, her keys and the takeout she had picked from down the street when the elevator door opened and she saw the front door of her apartment. It was padlocked to the nines, with an eviction notice posted on it, she walked over, dropping her bag on the ground and rattled the locks to test their solidity, before peeking into the window, everything was gone.

-Sons of bitches!

She kicked at the door before grabbing her back and swinging it into the elevator, she pushed the button back to the lobby and picked up the mail ragefully, her keys, she had a handful of Moo Goo Gay Pan in her hand when the door opened, her dad was on the other side, keys in hand, in the door, her mom was laughing at the practical joke, Happy smiled, rasping.

-You said you'd be back two days ago.

Her jaw tightened, she growled before tossing the handful of food at his chest, she hated when they did stupid things like that.

-Stop locking me out of my apartment, dad! And where is my stuff?

-Your stuff?

-My fucking furniture, and shit! Where's my stuff?

-Everything was in there when your mom fed Mittens yesterday.

Everett opened her mouth, to yell at her parents or curse the entire planet or promise death, she wasn't sure yet, but it would come out, possibly in Frenglish, and they better stop fucking around with her things.

But as the first syllable was about to pass her lips, she knew it wasn't them. Dan. It was that asshole Dan, who thought the world revolved around him.

-Was Dan here?

-He gave his key back, last night, which made us padlock the door.

-Baby, come for dinner. I have wine, smokes, a little bit of weed, and Florence is gone to a sleep over. And daddy can pick up the mess in the elevator.

-I can pick up the mess? How about I bash your teeth in?

-Pick up the shit, Happy, it was your idea.

Her mom crossed the lobby, grabbed Everett by the wrist and pulled her into the apartment Everett had always called the fishbowl, there was a large window in the living room overlooking the lobby so they could see anyone crossing the lobby and getting into the elevator. Everett had hid her laughter, she had no doubt it was her mom who came with the idea to padlock her place, it had Sailor Lowman written all over it.

Her mom, pushing fifty-five and living the pirate dream. She bought a large boat, invested in her own business, and now she promoted pirate cruises on the Mediterranean, every day at 11am for kids and 4pm for adults. She had been doing that for twelve years. And her dad, he'd just been invested in his apartment building, he was turning 65 years old in November, balder than ever, still a Son, the treasurer of the charter. Married sixteen years, almost seventeen, and still happy.

She was shoved into one of the retro chairs that were at the table in the kitchen, offered a large serving of food, an almost overflowing glass of red wine, a basket of bread, it was not dinner time yet, it was just four, but her mom's kids had probably all ran off one place or another letting her mother slav...

-I slaved over this dinner for hours! Hours! And what thanks do I get?

None, King went to his job on the boat, Flo was gone for a sleepover and Maddie was one place or another, being a drama queen. And Happy was not one to eat dinner, anymore. Around dinner time, he would always sit outside and watch the young chicks strutting their stuff on the street.

-Drink, drink, let's get drunk. Because fuck the world and long live pirates!

-How much did you drink?

The door closed, Sailor leaned back on the chair was was on, Everett did the same, and they saw Happy walking past the window pane, his cigarettes in his hand, shades on, he was already done cleaning the Chinese food mess, and he had changed his shirt to go sit outside.

-How was she?

-Fuck, the older I get, the more I wish dad would have killed her. She was barely bearable when I was a kid, now she just makes me wanna hurl.

-Fucking Esther. You got her into rehab again?

-Fuck her. I should have drowned her in a vat of acid. Let someone worthy breathe the air she's wasting.

-Was it that bad?

-Mommy, I haven't seen her in seven years, and the only thing she wanted was money. You remember how I begged and groveled dad to help me send her to rehab?

Begging and groveling was putting it very lightly, there wasn't much she wouldn't have done to get her way, the last time she had sent her mother to rehab, seven years before. And she had paid for two more rehabs out of her pocket since then. Everett pulled her cigarettes out of her bag, and lit one, almost slamming her lighter on the table as she put it down, she drowned her mouth with a long sip of red wine, there was nothing like being home with her family.

-Now she's doing pretty much anything she can get her hands on. Dad should have killed her. It would have spared me.

-I'm sorry, baby. You know I didn't know. Not until you told me.

-You're my mom. More than she ever was.

There's a moment of silence, Sailor lights her own cigarette, as Everett details the kitchenette, from where she sits, she can see her parents' bedroom, with the pirate comforter and her mom's dog sleeping on the bed, an ugly little beast that Happy hated with a passion, but would take a bullet for. To the right of that room, Florence's, to the left, King's.

-I really meant it, mom.

-You know it's gonna be hard. Look how long it took them to become integrated, Théo Lacroix was just accepted four years ago.

-I don't care about Théo. It's about me.

A silence, another drag of her cigarette and sip of the wine, she drank half of the glass, already, her mother started to nibble on her food, as Everett puts out her cigarette in the ashtray.

-What did dad say?

-He's not going to say anything. It's your life.

-You know I would do anything for it.

Everett grabs her cigarettes, her bag, she finishes the wine before taking had mother's keys to get into her own apartment, as Sailor watches from the kitchen table where dinner had remained untouched for the most part.

-You don't have to go about with your father's violence, Everett.

-Is there any other way to go about it?

She slammed the door, headed upstairs through the elevator again, this time having to share the lift with a young man who was looking at his feet, he got off before her, leaving her with a little bit of peace.

In her two room apartment, there was nothing left but a few broken furniture, the cat's little box, dust bunnies and cans on the counter, her clothes in the bathtub were cut to shreds, all the soles of her sneakers slashed and heels to her high-heels broken, bleach poured over, "slut" was painted on the wall above the broken bed frame, it looked as if he'd tried to take it out of the room without taking it apart, he had scratched the wall and broken the frame. Made a hole in the door.

That was one nagging little four letter word. She knew what she was and what she wasn't. And they both knew she had broken up with him the proper way before she had brought this leggy brunette back in her apartment to get her freak on after three years of missionary, boring sex. Dan had moved out of her room and into the couch, he'd been there for three weeks, looking for a new place to live, when she had brought this brunette back. He had initiated the breakup, with his speeches on how her ways were too wild, but he was too cowardly to finish the breakup, so she had. And now this?

Slut?

He was the one that had cheated on her twice with bitches off the street. But she had been raised SOA, and had never been bitter or naggy about it. because shit happen,. she was not around.

Slut. Painted over her favorite poster, vintage The Wall poster she had paid a fortune for. Slut, ruined, Pink Floyd Poster.

Mittens meowing in hunger made her turn around from heading towards the wall, she went to feed him a can of tuna and pet him between the ears before going back to her room and ripping the poster off the wall, and storming out without bothering to lock. Downstairs, she chucked her mother's keys at her father who was polishing his motorcycle and checking out chicks, arose the question of where she was heading looking like a rabid pitbull, "Fuck off" being the answer.

It wasn't very hard to know where Dan had went, his secretary was a lesbian. Two fingers and a minute of her time was all it took. He'd finally bought a house, moh-moh-oh-oh-Montr-oh! Merde, Montredon! Montredon! Rue du Lieutenant Moulin! In Montredon!

A little house with ivy all over the front, that would burn nicely. She got out of her car, this car she had forced him to buy because motorcycles were not safe, and had the son of a bitch drive into the house, like in the movies. A brick on the accelerator, she closed the door and put it in drive, and it did its magic. No kaboom, no weird tricks, just smashed into the living room window about halfway up the hood before stopping. Just enough to have Dan rush out of the house, screaming that she's a psycho bitch.

-Sweetheart, that's disappointing. Thought after three years you'd have better than, slut. Or bitch.

She tossed the now crumpled poster his way, she was all smiles in the declining daylight. He opened the ball up, to see what it was, warily, as if a rabid tarantula could jump out of it. Dan wasn't even good looking, she thought, he looked so ordinary. He lacked danger. Excitement. Dan and his stupid crew cut, and his stupid ten year plans, ties, tiny dick and lack of ambition for bigger things.

-You could have done better drowning my cat. Or, you know... Fuck my mother. I can't believe you're stupid enough. Tu pull this childish breakup bullshit on me! And now you have a house. the house you told me I should put off buying until I was better at my job. You have...

She chuckled, counting on her fingers.

-My furniture, in your house, that I haven't even finished paying for. Did you forget my last name?

She pointed herself frantically, a deranged smile hanging from her lips as he gulped. She wiped her lips, pulled a bottle of alcohol from her purse, she took a long swig from it, offered it to Dan.

-You don't have insurance yet, do you?

-Non.

-Aw. Pauvre, pauvre little Dan. Poor you. I feel for you, really.

-What will you do?

-Me? Nothing. You, well, who cares.

The bottle was thrown towards the hood of the car, it shattered against the ivy, her Zippo followed suit, Dan screamed and started towards the beginning of the blaze, mouth open in protest, only to be clocked across the face by Everett, he was so soft that he stumbled backwards and made her lose her balance.

-Burn, bitch! Burn!

Everett Stars K Lowman. Perfectly capable of breaking up like a decent human being. But breaking up the crazy bitch way was funner.


	3. Bathroom games

**Afternoon, there! Don't know for you, but it was a beautiful Sunday here. Ok. Well, here goes for the third chapter, as always, Kurt Sutter owns the names and likenesses he created, and I own my own characters. Please, enjoy, and leave a review, it would be much appreciated. In this chapter: HAPPY! And Happy Junior.**

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It was hard to remain straight-face and motionless as her new neighbor chewed her a new one. The chick obviously did not know who she was, and how much pull she had around here. So what Mittens liked to paw at the carpet she had stapled against the floor of her balcony? Apparently a lot, that cat was the devil, insufferable, crapped all over her plants. As if that was possible.

Finally, she finished her tirade, and her spitting she was doing in Everett's face, the elevator chimed, the old bitch smirked.

-I called the concierge. You'll see.

Oh, lovely. Really! She loved when bitch tenants called the landlord over for quarrels with her. She hoped it would be her dad.

Sure enough, he came out of the elevator waving his keys about, freshly washed, he must have worked this morning, did a quick job for the club. She was glad he was here, too. She needed to talk to him.

-Stars, again?

-Mazel tov, it's a bitch.

-Again? Why are they always bitches?

-Mittens clawing at the carpet.

-Mrs Galipeau, I've moved you around six times in the past year and a half. You're under my daughter who is never home. If that's not good enough for you, well, hit the road. Move to an old folks' home.

-I wanna talk to you, dad.

The old bitch was cross, as Everett pulled her father into her living room and slammed the door shut, some things never changed.

-This about Dan taking your furniture or you burning down his house?

-No. Listen, sit down, cause this is really serious, dad, and I'm not fucking about with it.

She went to the kitchen, brought him his favorite beer, brought it to him at the couch, before sitting across from him. She could have sworn he knew what this was about. Did he speak to his wife about their last conversation, two weeks ago? She's been laying pretty low since she burned her ex's house down to the ground, she only went out once, for groceries.

-What, Everett?

-I want you to sponsor me, dad.

-Where? The AA?

-The club you big dumdum. I wanna be a member.

-That's not gonna happen, baby. You know it's not gonna fly by the guys. It's no place for a woman.

-I've been hanging around the clubhouse for almost ten years! You taught me my way around a tattoo gun and now they all come to me because your elbows are giving! I'm not a fucking wannabe. They all like having me around, they all told me so themselves.

-Like a daughter, Everett.

Happy sighs, puts the beer on the coffee table, he knows his daughter. She's a Lowman, she's just going to argue on and on and never stop.

-I really want this, dad. There's nothing I want more. I tried mom's life, I'm not a fucking pirate. I tried Esther's, she's too fucked up. I tried the normal people life. Driving in a cage and have a shitty ass job. I'd kill for it, dad.

-Would ya?

-I would choke my own mother for it.

-Find Lavallin and bring me his right hand, and I'll see what I can do to sponsor you.

-Lavallin.

-Find the fucker. If you manage that, I'll do all I can to sponsor you, baby. It's gonna be hard, but I'm in your corner, you know that. You bring Laurence Moreau his archenemy's hand, you may get somewhere.

He stood, rubbed the top of her hair and leaned down to kiss it, before quietly leaving her apartment, this was the turning point. She wasn't wondering if she'd have the guts to take that path, she knew she would. She graduated the lycée by an ass, because she had an horrible attendance record, always being expelled for fighting one or another. Twenty-five years old and she already had a thick police file. Arson, assault, disturbing the peace, and all. She liked starting fires, quite skilled at it. She had inherited her father's violent streak, and Sailor's people skills.

Law Moreau knew where Lavallin was, but being in the police's scope, he couldn't get François Lavallin himself. Nor could his guys. Something told her that Happy must have been thinking about using her to take out Lavallin for a while, she was hanging around the club, but she wasn't really connected to it to a higher degree, being a woman she'd technically never be considered as a prospect, so given a lot less attention then a hang-around or a prospect would.

You can't be a prospect of a motorcycle club if you don't even have your own bike. She had a rust bucket, a project she and a friend had, before that friend got shot a few years before. She could probably get two thousand euros for it, if she struck lucky. A jump at the bank, she had only so much in savings, but her parents still put a few dollars in her bank account every week, even if she had long left the nest, so she could take the rust bucket and trade and put most of her savings on a second hand Night Rod Special, it had ten thousand clicks on the counter, but it looked beautiful. Took a few hours to register and licence, but she had all her permits and no outstanding or unpaid tickets.

Lavallin lived in Martigues, just far enough outside of Marseille to safely retreat out of harm's way after he stirred the pot with the Sons. Just a forty minute ride outside of downtown. She had no plan, yet. Just playing it by ear. Best method for making it past sixty, according to her dad. That sucker she was taking care of today ran an extortion scam on the marina, Martigues was a fisherman's paradise and he saw dollar signs. So all she had to do was find a nice café, order herself something to drink and wait until he came around to claim his money to the poor fishermen who were just trying to feed their families.

Everett was two and a half glasses of wine and almost a whole pack of cigarettes in, when the fat prick came over to the marina she sat near of, Money from Pink Floyd was blaring in her ears through her headphones, getting his attention will be easy, all men had a weakness for a well shaped girl. So she removed her motorcycle jacket, folded her t-shirt to expose her midriff and tamed her wild hair a little bit. Her boobs and belly button would do the job for her. She wasn't skinny, nor thick, she was a savant combination of both, she had managed to figure out a workout regiment that gave her her father's arms and her mother's soft belly, and legs almost strong enough to put a kicking horse to shame. She wasn't scared or worried, even if she ended up going to Lavallin's house alone.

He came over after noticing her, once he was finished taking advantage to people that were already struggling thanks to him, and asked her in French what she was up to, alone, pretty thing like her. She gave the most sincere smile she could give to this dirty prick, he was pot-bellied and balding, his teeth were dirty and she could smell his sweaty pits from where she was.

-Just doin' the tourist thing.

-I could buy you a glass of the wine.

-You could, I certainly wouldn't be against it. Garçon! Two glasses of this again. Deux.

The waiter hurries to serve them, Lavallin the rich and powerful, and the tourist. The fatso does small talk, tries to be charming, even if a brick could do a better job, she calls her muses to act as interested as she can, the good thing of having lived the past decade and a half with Madison Steele and Sailor Lowman, possibly the most Oscar-worthy actresses she'd ever been given to meet. Maddie, her little sister, could turn up the drama on a dime.

All the bullshit coming out of his mouth is the most interesting thing this poor, stupid little tourist was ever given to hear. French men are so fucking attractive and interesting. So at the end of the bottle of wine, he invites her home, she knows it's in. She rides bitch on his bike, really hopes no one she knows would see her sitting on this stupid ass Gilera Fuoco, the worst bike she ever was around.

Inside his house, she's barely walked past the lobby that he's already trying to get her jacket off, resisting the urge to kick him in the balls is atrociously painful, "chill, take your time! Where's the bathroom?" she asks in French, she will have to find something in there that will inflict enough pain for her to make her way to a primary weapon, she only has her stun gun on her right now.

After a piss, she considered her options. There were a lot. A lot. She could just sit still and wait until he came to find her. All she needed was to find some gloves, any gloves. Under the sink, some yellow gloves for washing the dishes.

"Chérie, are you okay?"

-Yeah, come in.

The door opened, and Lavallin was welcomed into the bathroom with the porcelain lid of the toilet tank to the face, it was solid, so she could lower it and swing it a second time, blood gushed as he fell backwards, and she could use it a third time to lower straight against his ribs, she heard them cracking, at least two of them. A bar of soap into the mouth to muzzle him, and some toilet cleaner in the eyes, he tried to scream in pain, it was absolutely beautiful. She grabbed the chipped lid from the floor where she had dropped it to grab the drain cleaner and stomped him a few more times until she was out of breath, before catching her breath, he was barely moving. Now she needed something to chop that hand.

She was disappointed that of all the things she could have found, the only thing sharp and strong enough was a meat cleaver. She voiced her disappointment loudly, going up the stairs, Lavallin wasn't in the bathroom anymore, there was a trail of blood going to one of the bedrooms. He was trying to reach for the rotary phone on the nightstand, it made her laugh.

-Peek-a-boo! I see you!

* * *

Waiting for her mom to leave for work had been hard, hiding in the lobby, but once she had left, Everett went into her parents' apartment, her father was lifting weights in her old bedroom, catching up with the news, a house that had burned down in Martigues last night, foul play was suspected, he turned to her when she came in, lost his smile.

-That wasn't the deal.

-Oh I know the deal.

He raised his hands to catch the grocery bag she flung his way from behind her back, opened it and pulled the hand out of it by the pinky, it was turning colors, already, he sighed, looked up at his oldest daughter.

-You know I like fires.

It couldn't be anyone else's hand, because Lavallin had very distinctive tattoos. Happy put the hand back in the bag, wrapped it tightly before putting it between his knees.

-This can never go to mom's ears, Everett.

-Come on. We had a deal.

-I'm not going back on it. I'm just saying I like my balls where they are. I'll talk to Laurence. I'll do my best, baby.

She smiled, ran at him to hug him, he laughed and squeezed her, ran his hand in her hair before letting her go, he wanted to finish his workout before his elbows would start to hurt so much. She crossed the hallway, the living room and reached the door, she had almost had it closed when she heard her dad warn her with his raspy voice.

-And stop setting people's shit on fire.


	4. Sons and Daughters

**Another day, another chapter! I really hope everyone likes what they are reading, if you don't, well, drop me a review! Tell me what I'm doing wrong! If you do, well... Review anyways! All of the Sons of Anarchy names and likenesses belong to Kurt Sutter. My own original characters belong to me. I don't plan on creating a myriad of them as I did in Stars. I make no money from this work of fiction. Enjoy, and see you all in two days!**

* * *

She felt important, for being summoned at the clubhouse of the Marseilles Sons of Anarchy chapter. She wasn't usually girly, but she'd put a lot of time in front of the mirror, to look like she cared, but didn't really, with her distressed boyfriend-jeans and her big leather jacket, rolling in on her new bike wearing enough spray-net that if she had laid her bike she may have caught on fire.

She had never lit a cigarette before to look cool. She smoked because, as her father, it helped her not murder people when it wasn't the right time or right place. Calmed her nerves. So she lit one, helmet still on her head, it made Philippe Lefort chuckle from the shade of the tin roof in front of the clubhouse, where himself was smoking. When he spoke, it was with an accent from Québec. Much different than that spoken around here with the Marseillais accent.

-Having fun?

-You're supposed to be in awe in front of all of this coolness.

-But then I would look smitten with only you. That's not my rep.

-You tool. How did Law sound this morning?

-Very hungover. Emma was up in his case.

-When is she not? She has the whole club by the balls. Dad here yet?

-Nay. They didn't want him here.

Her heart beat faster. That could not be good that they asked her dad to stay away. It was going to be a big fat no, no girl would ever be a prospect to this club. But before she could start stressing over it, Lefort had lowered his hand on her shoulder, smiling his crooked smile, the one that made him look like Heath Ledger's Joker without makeup.

-How about we start by taking that helmet off?

-They're gonna say no, are they?

-Come on.

She was dragging her feet, now, all she could hope for was the the rejection be gentle enough that she could hold her tears in until she hit the highway. She expected to meet in Church, but they were sitting around the pool table, they had taken their chairs from inside the Church. At the head, Lawrence "Law" Moreau, the president, pulling on his cigar, eyes darting from her to Phillipe Lefort that was holding her hand. To his left, Jacques Tellier, his step-son, the VP of the club. Everyone called him Jack. Fucking pretty boy, she never thought much of him since he tried to pick her up one night he was drunk, she'd said no, he called her a slut, and his girlfriend Lara Nouilles had freaked out on her big time.

The other end of the table is where her father would have sat, in the Church, because it was closer to the safe. It sat empty for her. As she sat, she detailed the familiar faces. Sargeant at Arms Robert "Bob Seger" Manseau, with his big mop of salt and pepper hair and his glasses and big beard. Philippe, who went by Joker because of his chibs. Randy Coin, big, quiet guy who predicted the weather, thus being nicknames Rain Queen. Alexandre Traqueur, with an even voice and baby blues that gave it away that he wasn't the sanest person of this ragtag bunch, they called him Tiges, because of his knack at impaling people with different rods and pipes he found laying around.

Alexandro Montel, just a cute guy without much of a backstory, he had transferred last year from Spain. Georges "Le Rat" Prud'Homme, nicknamed so because of his facial features. Théo LaCroix, the only black man in this charter. A very good friend of Jack.

Jean-Charles Lortie, the neurotic one, whom was going by Juicy due to his steroid use. Hermond Losique, she hadn't had his personality pegged yet, partly due to the fact that he'd only transferred back last year, but mainly because he was Ukrainian and did not speak French, and his English was so hashed that she had given up trying to make sense of him. His mother had been French, and Losique was one of the only thing people understood when he spoke, so everyone called him that.

There was also Henri Weston and his father Piermond, who was one of the original members of this charter. Everyone called Henri Hopie, and Piermond Poney. She had never dared to ask why. That was the lot of them.

They were all quiet, she wasn't used to that. It just reinforced the feeling of "no", as she pulled her hands on her knees. As Law paraphrased for a while in French, her gaze locked on the hand that she had came in possession of three days before, it was in a Tupperware in front of Jack, it had turned a few shades of grey and green, it looked nasty. Why did it take so long for them to ask her to come? Oh my god, they were gonna say no. They were going to kill her for mingling into club business by taking out the arch-enemy, they would strip her dad from his patches, kick him out of the club he had put forty plus years of his life into. Mom was going to have to sell her pirate on the sea business because they would have to leave Marseilles. Maddie would come back periodically to take a shit on her unmarked grave because she would have ruined her life with her mingling in club business. Her dad would deny her very existence for the rest of his life because she had cost him what was the most important thing in his life. She was no better than Esther! She WAS NO BETTER TH...

-... and so we decided to give you a shot at being an enforcer, for a while... Everett. Are you okay?

-Yeah-why-would-I-not-be-okay?-Uh-what-were-you-saying?

Oh, crap, she was hyperventilating, she'd let her imagination run wild, but she did not have Sailor and Maddie's innate talent at keeping it all under wraps and looking like she had herself in check. Her whole train of thought had transpired on her face, into her breathing, and all but Law that was just too busy saying how great and generous he was for what deal he'd just put on the table, they all noticed that she was freaking the fuck out.

-Fuck I need a drink.

She felt light-headed and near fainting as she rose to her feet, if her dad would have been here, he would have punched her in the arm and told her to pipe the fuck down. Man up. Grow some balls. At the bar, she touched a bunch of bottles, reading the labels without even seeing them, until she recognized the Captain Morgan logo, she guzzled at the bottle until her throat felt on fire. The good thing was that if these guys were thick enough, it could pass for her being nervous of the honor of whatever deal was just offered to her.

Nope, none of them were that dumb, their eyes twinkled just too damn much, even if they would go along with it, as she sat back down in her father's worn out chair.

-Say that again?

-Enforcer. For a year. Then we'll see.

Enforcer. Not a hang-around, not a prospect. She gets a kutte, a top rocker "Sons of Anarchy", a bottom rocker, "Marseilles" but no center patch with the cloaked Death and scythe. A blank, like prospects. And for the front, she gets a couple of patches. One with the name that they call her around here, Stars, one with her position, "Enforcer". No vote, no hazing, just one year of doing dirty, nasty jobs that they could not trust the prospects with, or that the members themselves couldn't carry out due to being directly linked.

She held on to her true reaction as she took the rockers and patches, she melted into a faked melt-down of gratefulness, promised to be the best enforcer they ever got, proudly put the blank kutte on and the rockers carefully into the pocket, before leaving. She held on to her tears, partially because of her glasses that she wore to ride, and once she reached the apartment complex she lived in, she saw the green bike out front, she nearly ran into it as she pulled to the curb.

Once inside her parents' fish-tank apartment, she threw the blank kutte at her father as hard as she could as she exploded.

-I'm good to carry out the bitch work, is that it? Enforcer? Really? It would have been less humiliating if they'd asked me to fuck my way around the whole club, like, all the fucking charters! Suck the dick of every Sons from Alaska to Australia! Fuck! Enforcer!

-Calm the fuck down before I backhand you.

-I'm not gonna calm the fuck down! I made a fucking fool out of myself in there! I'm gonna be all of tonight's talk, thanks to you! You could have given me a fucking heads up! You knew what was going on! You knew the second you gave Lavallin's hand to Lawrence and Jack!Is this to teach me a lesson or something?

But Happy is quiet, sitting on the couch, she notices that his left elbow is really swollen, and bruised. He has two beers on the table, Everett can hear Florence in her bedroom talking on her cellphone with her friends, "like, totally", King is in the door frame of his bedroom, looking at his oldest sister as if he could punch a hole through her. Something happened. Her dad was waiting for her. He told them, or at least told King something that he was about to tell her. She felt a pit forming in her stomach, recognizing the blank kutte that she had put on earlier. It was her father's kutte. He hadn't worn it in two whole days. She had noticed that, but she hadn't really realized it, amid her stress of what the club could say to her.

-Dad?

If he told her that he had given up his spot in the Sons for this shitty Enforcer spot, she might murder him. King closes his door, why isn't she nicer to her sixteen years old brother? He looks so much like their dad. And he isn't tainted by the Sailor/Maddie craziness. He's just a Lowman named after their parents' first date.

She sits down, she only notices when her butt touches the cushion.

-Daddy?

-I haven't been able to start my bike in ten days.

They look at each other for a moment, she can feel her eyes welling up. All of her rage is gone. The club is her father's entire existence. And she knows what happens to bikers that can't ride their own bikes. He had a lone tear rolling fatly down his cheek, it impressed her, she didn't remember ever seeing her father crying. It clung at his stubbly chin for a moment, before falling against his shirt, leaving a soft grey spot on it.

-I haven't even told mom, yet. King knows because he picked me up from the ground, in the parking lot. She was gone with the car, so I walked to the club. It took me everything I had to have them give you that Enforcer spot, baby. Even my kutte. I groveled and sworn up and down that you'd do that piece of leather as much honor as I had done it for forty-four years. I spent sixteen years in jail overall for it. I've never wished more that you'd been born a boy than I do now, baby. That they'd let King be a full patch in a heartbeat if I asked the right way, but I can't get any better for my daughter, for the love of my fucking life, than a shitty ass, thrown together Enforcer patch. That club is full of fucking enforcers, baby. From Tiges to Hopie to Rain. Jax Teller, God rest his soul, would have never stood for that kind of bullshit. In Charming, you'd have been a full patch for at least three years, by now. I wish I had never left. I fucking miss Charming every day of my life.

Sobs were rolling out of of her throat as she listened to probably the first time her father had been so raw and honest with her in a decade. If not more. Her father was never a man to waste words, he was a guy of action. And now he could barely pull the trigger.

-I'm wearing down your mom on that retirement thing. When Flo leaves for College, I'm hoping to take your mom back to LA. I want to die where I was born.

She slammed the door behind herself as she ran out of the fish-tank. Her daddy was her hero, no bullet could take him down or out, and he was like a dog on a car ride when they whizzed by. She'd grown up to be like him, and to hear him talking of his own mortality did not sit well with her. Happy Lowman was fucking immortal. As Kenny Winston had joked, they still told stories of him in Charming. Even if he'd been gone over fifteen years.

Was she just a seat-warmer, until King would be old enough to join the rank of SOA?

She was crying herself out on the rooftop terrace when she felt, again, big arms closing in around her, she was lifted from the two stacked milk crates like she weighed a feather, it smelled like gas, grease and Play Boy New York for Men around her, she buried her face into Rain Queen's neck, the sobs were now hurting her throat. Did he know, or did her father call? She would murder him if he did, her major crush on Randy Coin was supposed to be a secret.

-Je suis juste un seul homme, bichette. Même avec ton père, je fais pas le poids contre eux.

"I'm only just one man, doll-face. Even with your father, I'm no match against them", he leaned his forehead against hers, his breath smelled of candies and the energy drinks he guzzled down at the speed of light, he's picked up the habit after he stopped shooting up heroin and popping speed, and started training instead. Sometimes, even when she had a boyfriend or girlfriend, she had moments of weakness where she'd sneak into the clubhouse, knowing he just got back from the gym, and she would go sit in his bathroom to smell his odor. She almost got caught, once. Major crush on Randy Coin didn't even begin to describe it. Her heart swelled of his proximity.

-You'd have me as a prospect?

-I'm sponsoring you as a prospect. Now that your dad is gone. I like you, Stars. You're fun. Bright. And you give good... Ink.

She could not help the chortle that came up her throat, the innuendo was there, they couldn't take it back. She pushed her head against his neck further, her nose was trying to take advantage of his proximity to determine where exactly he sprayed said Playboy New York for Men.

-You really think we can change their mind in a year's time, Rain?

-I think you can change their minds in less time than that.

There's the spot. Against his jawline, almost where his ear, jawline and neck meet, it smells like a little slice of paradise. She almost gasps when he put a hand, one of his big hands on the nap of her neck, squeezing gently, his hands are so big he could easily choke the life out of her with only one of them. When she risked looking up, he was smiling down on her, he brushed his nose against hers, again, and again, herself did not think she would gather the balls to press her lips on his, despite how close they were to hers. And he seemed good enough with playing "nosies", for a while. Once he got enough of them, he pushed her head back against his neck, nose straight on that spot she had searched, it made her smile despite how sad she was feeling, deep down.

Maybe things could be easier for her towards the Sons, if her father wasn't right there for comparison purposes.

Shit. Her dad wasn't a Son anymore. It went against everything she had ever known of him, ever since his existence came to light, when she was eight, nine years old.


	5. Le you and Le me against Le world

**Filler chapter! As usual, Kurt Sutter owns that you recognize from the SOA TV show, and I own my own characters. That's it. Read! Go on!**

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Everett genuinely cannot remember the last time she had fun at one of these parties at the clubhouse. Maybe she never did at all, that would be consistent to what memories she kept of her mother, so maybe, just maybe it was genetic? Can boredom be genetic?

Then again, it was very hard to find some enjoyment in her father's farewell party. He seemed to be enjoying his last good times with the Sons, his wife too, but Everett just sat there miserably, suckling on beer after beer. After beer. The wish that Sailor was her birth mother was there, again. Maybe she would be a more balanced person, like King, or Florence. But not Maddie, tainted she was, that one. Crazy, but in a cool, has a lot of friends/is popular/everyone finds her endearing way. Not a lunatic.

"Hey, Stars! You gonna tattoo me?"

No please, no thank you, what's wrong with these people? She still nods, heads to her father's old room to pick up the things she needs to tattoo Lawrence, she should work on his back piece, it has been a while. Don't be a bitch and write something on there that she'd regret. Like "miserable cocksucker", she was still very much bitter about this enforcer bullshit, even if it had been almost a week. If he passed out right now she would put a dick and balls on his forehead. But Lawrence seldom drank, he was a tool like that. And his wife Emma, Jack's mother was all over them, as if Everett would hold any sexual interest to this old meat sack that looked like an ape to her. The only thing that could even remotely be of interest to her was his height. She liked them tall.

Across the room, Rain smiled at her as he was engrossed in conversation with some croweaters, Rain didn't smile. So she must have been having a perma-bitch face as she was putting some ink to Law's back. It looked good, she did good work. Her dad had been teaching her his art for a decade, there, and she knew what she had to do.

It was nearing eleven when she decided she was done for the night and maybe just tonight, she'd stick to two beers and still have the balls to grab Rain Queen and bring him upstairs to his little room there, and screw his little brains melted. It was something she was toying with, since their moment on the roof of the apartment complex, but she was hesitant to give in to that. She certainly did not want to owe her potential spot as a Son because she had been sleeping with a member. Because she was second generation, yes. Because she was carrying the second/third generation, hell to the fucking no.

Instead she headed to the bar and had a third beer, and struck conversation with a half-wasted girl that would have been DTF had she not been so sloshed, Everett could have went for it; the girl looked half-decent, but knowing how many dicks had transited through there, knowing her dad probably stuck it to her at one point warded her off. She would have to wait for a new batch of croweaters if she did not want to commit incest by proxy.

"Stars? Someone here for you" now what? She left the croweater at the bar after getting handsy a bit but making it clear that it would not go past breast fondling and headed towards the door, whoever wanted something to do with her.

It was that time of the year again? No, it was nowhere near December, she thought as she set her dark brown eyes on her ex, Martin, the douche cut his hair, it was the only thing she still found remotely cute about him after so long.

-Did you sign my fucking divorce papers already?

Because enough was enough was enough. Four years she had been trying to be divorced. Almost five years she had moved out of his life. Never called, never wrote, never cared but he still showed up periodically to make her miserable.

-Could this night be any shittier, man?

-Please, come home. We need you.

-Holy fuck, man, move on! Get a fucking life already. I thought I made fucking clear when I left that I wanted nothing to do with you. Sign the fucking papers, take half my fucking money and fuck off, Mart!

Oh, screw that. Came a moment in a girl's life where nothing sent a message across better then a broken beer bottle to the face, a few facial scars to remind you never to stick your dick in crazy and a good old restraining order. Why had she cared in the first place anyways? Life's too short.

But as she is a few inches away from slashing his face really well, two things stop her. Three.

First, the cops would show up and ask questions. Second, she would have to clean up the broken glass and bloody mess on the floor. Plus it would kind of spoil a bit of the fun of the party. And third, his green eyes. His mother fucking green eyes. He looked near tears. Not that she cared a lot. That she didn't love him anymore, didn't mean she could just play surgeon on his face. He had always done the best he could.

-Fuck off, Martin. Go home. Stop coming here unless you're giving me my divorce. I mean it.

She turned around after dropping the bottle, she would take her jacket and leave, maybe go for a ride and find a random dick to go to bed with. She had gotten good over the years at pretending she was banging Randy Coin, in her head. She had already banged him about a hundred times. In her head.

But Martin grabs her by the wrist, and the freaking "sappy movies, romantic at heart"asshole pulled her to him, their lips collided, literally, she had a sensitive nose because of the climate here, and now she would probably have a nosebleed. Way to be romantic, asshat.

Everett did not want to kiss him. At all. So she started clawing at him, enough that he would get the message to take a long walk off a short pier, but not actually enough to injure him. Martin. He'd been a hang around, forever ago, but it just hadn't been the life for him. He just wanted to ride his bike for fun. He was a Sunday rider. Back then, before she had beef with the whole world, she had seen herself being with him for a long time. Now it all just seemed childish. A teenage crush taken too far with marriage. He had to parted with the club very amicably, but the break up with the Lowman clan had been nothing short of disastrous.

Now she just wanted to be divorced from him, so she could maybe marry somewhere else. Maybe Rain, if they got there, once she became a Son. She would love to marry Rain. He was quiet, he was nice, he didn't have too much baggage, two ex-wives but no kids, he was loyal and he made a pretty penny with the gym he exploited north of downtown Marseilles. No house, but he lived in the same apartment since his first divorce had been finalized. For Randy Coin she would fill up all the paperwork to change her name. Not for Martin Depardieu, not for Daniel Thomas, but for Randy Coin she would.

Her jacket is grabbed, as well as a rag to shove under her nose, she is indeed bleeding like a pig, outside, she hides behind a low wall for a while, at least until she's done bleeding and she is sure that Martin is gone, before getting on her bike, she'll catch a few hours of sleep, then she would probably take a few days, go to Paris. Maybe visit her grandmother's grave, and Maddie on campus in college.

* * *

Everett knocked on the door, tough she immediately regretted doing so or coming here in the first place when she heard Maddie squeal from the inside of the campus apartment; something she could not make up from outside, but the door swung open, and her nineteen years old sister just jumped her, climbed her like a damn octopus while using that baby voice at her, the one Sailor used at the dogs.

-Ah you're here ermahgerd, yuh here! Mah sista ist hurrr!

-What is wrong with you?

-Mon sisi! Mon sisi is le visit me! Erhmahgerd!

-English, motherfucker!

-You visit me, in Le Paris! Le Paris, Evie! Le mo'focking Paris!

Everett scratched her temple with a sigh, as Maddie was cartoonishly crawling all over her in that octopus hold. Now, she actually loved when her little sister did stuff like that. She loved Maddie, it had been the two of them against the world for most of their teenage-hood, until Maddie had left for Paris two years before for school. The amount of boys and girls Everett had fought to keep her little sister out of trouble was worrisome, but Everett would take none of it back, even if she acted like a Samuel L. Jackson character around Madison.

Then , as abruptly as the love-assault had started, Maddie was rushing down the hallway of the dark flat, yelling, Everett wasn't sure if it was for her or her sister herself or someone else that might have been in there, she still went inside and closed the door, as Madison came back in a rush, now wearing pants and a beanie hat on her head.

-I'm so mofockin' hungry man take me out and feed me, but you got to act like le girlfriend or something, so le stupid boys all leave me alone after you leave.

-Bitch, saying "le" randomly in your sentences does not make you sound French. Or cool. You're a fucking moron. And I ain't holding your fucking hand like last time.

-No, no, that's le cool, man. Like, play it hard to get or something.

Everett raised her hands in a strangling motion before being pulled out by that almost-redhead tornado that was her sister, the advantage of not having the same set of parents, they looked nothing alike. Everett looked like Happy, a bit like Esther. Madison looked a lot like her dad, too, tough she had a lot of resemblance to Sailor.

But one good thing about Maddie's "two dads" is they are both avid motorcyclists, so she knows motorcycles. It's sort of a prerequisite to be a Lowman. So once they get to the parking, Maddie is in admiration in front of the bike, they have an actual, neutral ground discussion about the specs and mechanics and the bike, that she looks up and down, getting on her hands and knees to the ground, even if it makes her boobs almost hang out of her shirt. Of all Lowmans' Maddie is by far the best endowed in that department.

-That is one nice bike. What did Dappy say about it?

-Dappy ain't talking bikes anymore.

Madison looks up, pulls herself back up, Dappy had always been how she was calling Everett, King and Flo's dad, Dad-Happy, and they both called Maddie's biological dad Victor Screamo-dad, it had stemmed from a comment from Happy, almost a decade ago, that Victor's band was starting to sound less metal and more emo.

-Why isn't he? His elbows are getting bad, are they? What is mommy saying?

-Just hop on, bitch. I'll tell you when we're sitting down somewhere with foodstuffs.

They aren't going too far, in the very possible event that Maddie would do the drama queen thing and run off, so she would not have to run across half the town, Everett had done that once, upset her really bad, Maddie had taken off, and ninety minutes later the phone had rang, Madison had a huge asthma attack and she was in the hospital. No one knew she had asthma. Until then.

And around the table, Everett tells her sister everything, fills every blank left open to interpretation by Sailor on the phone, so Maddie gets the whole picture. For once, Madison shuts the hell up and listens without interrupting, sucking on the straw of her pink lemonade, big hazel eyes looking at her older sister intently.

-So, that's about all of it. Minus all the fucks I give or don't give, and how pissed off I am.

-Oh, that was the cold hard facts version? I couldn't tell the difference.

Everett rolled her eyes, flipped a double bird and lit herself a cigarette despite the placard on the wall nearby, she was never one to follow the rules.

-Fuck you.

-That's gross! We're related. Ew! Ew! Le Ew! Bitch, stop looking at me like that! Ew! Policier! Le girl is le nasty!

On the inside, Everett is laughing, on the outside, she's about ready to strangle her sister. Some guy walks by, wolf whistles Maddie and stops walking to try and get her number, Everett is already standing up, pulling her knife off its sheath.

-We gonna have a problem, boy? You leave my girl alone, or I'll murder you.

He flees, Madison is almost falling from her chair in laughter, until Everett titty-slaps her, she bellows a "owwwww!" so loud that the whole street stops walking/eating/whatever they were doing to look at them.

-Bitch that hurts!

And Madison returns the flavor, smacks Everett right across the chest as hard as she can, it's almost cute. And Madison is mumbling under her breath "stupid bitch, punching me in the tit, gonna tell mom", it makes Everett smile.

-You done?

-Yeah. Le fuck you.

-Le fuck you, too. So... When they leave. You're staying? With me?

-Where the hell else you want me to be? It's you and I against the world.

-More like me against the world and you're looking over my shoulder hurling insults and potatoes.

-Yes! That's how it is. And that's how it always will be. Because you'll never let me go to jail for B&E's or assault.

-I hate you. You're gonna be so ridiculous when you're thirty-five, married, three kids and still hurling potatoes over my shoulder.

-Oi! It knocked him right in the face.

-I spent a weekend in jail!

-But you didn't get charged!

Everett scratches her scalp, she will not delve into that conversation, there's just no way it will end well, especially since Maddie had food handy, and they had already started to punch each other where it hurts the most. She just watches her sister scarf that food down like she did not eat anything in months, when her waistline suggests otherwise, she's well fed, and just putting on a show. Hungry, broke college student. Yeah, right.

A Everett reaches to hug her sister, Maddie does that weird thing again, where she freezes and holds her breath like she could die from her older sister's hug, she doesn't hug back, and booms into "eww!" and "gross, stranger danger" once Everett gets back on her chair.

-So, who's been making your life a living hell, lately? I have a few punches I could sure spend on someone that pissed off a Lowman.

Everett barely has the time to toss money on the table to cover their bill that she's pulled by the arm by Madison, there's a bitch that's been messing with her boyfriend, and she needs to learn her lesson, and be put back in her place. No one fucks with Madison Steele's boyfriend. Allright, heads will roll, then.


	6. Meow is Cat for (Expletive)

**Hi. I'm tired, cranky and way past my deadline and I don't have a single line of this chapter written, so I have no clue what will happen in it! So bear with me, because this chapter will be written and proofread in the next fifty minutes (Don't hate me for the tardiness, I had to take my kid to the doctor!)**

 **Kurt Sutter stuff belongs to Kurt Sutter, Mudd stuff belongs to Mudd and no one makes money from this. Ok. Here goes nothing!**

* * *

It's bright, and hard, uncomfortable, it feels like she slept on a rock. But it's _just too damn noisy_ to be outside. Phones ringing, people talking, there's a throb in her head, her mouth feels like a hot potato and she's so thirsty. And hungry. Everett could dive head first in a bucket of fried chicken she was so hungry.

No.

No.

Nonononononononono! No.

Too late. The thought of food made her barf onto her own feet, and the fact that she barfed on her own feet made her barf on them again, she just started crying. Why? Was it her time of the month again?

She managed to open her eyes despite the splitting pain, and saw what was on her feet. Oh, that's why. That and the fact that she was in the drunk tank.

Oh, the lovely accommodations she had. A cement bed, no window but two very bright neon lights, bars for a door, a pot to piss in and a chickenpox blanket that must not have been washed since the time of Louis Quatorze. What did she remember last?

It takes her a lot of effort, to dig through the hazy portions of her brain, it's a blur, but it could have involved whipped cream, spiced rum, a dare from Rain and two hot chicks, one a brunette with fair skin and the other a rocking redhead with a thick Irish accent.

-Garçon? A little help, here?

Everyone with a desk in her immediate surroundings were staring at her with disgust reading all over their faces. It couldn't have smelled good, either. She sort of felt bad for whatever poor sucker would be forced to come and help her.

It took about forty minutes, but she was showered with the so-kind help of a fire hose, she wouldn't need to go and get a peeling, thank you, Gendarme, for removing at least five layers of her skin, thrown into some baggy, shapeless prison clothes, processed, given her court date and released, after signing a promise to present herself to the tribunal.

Outside as always, her daddy, usually, he would be leaning against his bike, arms crossed, this time, he's leaning against her mom's Pirate-mobile, smoking a cigarette he flicks as soon as she comes out, and like any other time he ever got her out of this place, he grabs her in his arms and hugs her, holds her for a long time, just rubbing her dark blond hair until she moves away. Once, her third or fourth time, they actually stayed like that hugging near the bike for four whole hours.

-Your little sister called.

Wait, what? What happened to the dare and the brunette and the redhead and Rain and the rum? The tube of fluffy whip?

-Maddie?

-Yeah, Maddie.

No wait, this was Paris, not Marseilles.

Oh, shit. Shit. Fuck. Maddie! Panis immediately setting in.

-Where is she?

-They released her this morning, from the hospital, she's fine. Three stitches, a few scratches. The super of her place already replaced the window, I helped him up the security, this morning.

And now it was nighttime. And Maddie was alone. He'd left her alone, was he out of his mind? She yelled that at her father, shaking him as if she could get an answer out of him faster.

-...crazy mother-fucking son of a bitch! Alone?

-She ain't alone, Rain and Tiges are with her. Now could I pretty please get the non-dramatic version of yesterday's events? I ain't mom, so I got no clue of what she was talking about.

Well, there's dinner. One whole bottle of wine between the two of them. Then there's the bar, they went dancing. A few shots, two beer for Maddie, one beer for Everett, who refused to drive her sister after having four shots into her system, she stuck to water after that. The guy trying to get Maddie's number on the dance floor, and Maddie blowing him off. He came back, with two friends and hopefully enough persuasion to get her to leave with them. Everett and her knife was more persuasive to make them fuck off.

Then there's home. Half a bottle of wine for Maddie, a lot of Jack Daniels for Everett, with beer, she'd lost count. Maybe a whole small bottle? And How to lose a guy in ten days on TV. It made for good drunken small talk.

Then there's a bit of black. Sleeping? Or at least laying in the dark in the living room.

Then there's Maddie screaming in pure terror. And a guy above Everett, smirking under his ski mask until Everett headbutted him, didn't even feel it, that's how drunk she was. And in the bedroom, two buddies trying to rape her little sister, they came through a door and left through the front window, one with Everett's knife stuck in his asshole, literally, all the way to the guard.

-So, you want to find whatever asshat tried to touch Maddie, you find the one that got his asshole sewn back in place last night. Did they touch her?

-No, you did right. You did good. We'll find the bastards. What did they slap on you?

-Intoxication, property damage, some bullshit. I got to court in three months.

-Get in. I'm taking you to your sister.

Sister who got hurt by Everett, but wouldn't say a word about the matter, because what was three stitches and a few scratches when it could have been a lot worst. Tough it wasn't the most brilliant idea Everett ever had, to smash a lamp on an asshole that was leaning over her sister. It had lead to Maddie getting three stitches for a gash on her shoulder. They still hugged forever, and while Happy raised the possibility that Maddie would go back to Los Angeles with them when they went back, the sisters knew better. They were "Ride or Die", and if Everett stayed in Marseilles with the Sons, so would Maddie.

In the meanwhile, Maddie had to stay in Paris for school and Everett was called back by the Sons to carry out a job. It took a while for Maddie to get her sister out the door and onto her bike, Happy had promised to stay overnight as Everett rode with Rain and Tiges back down to Marseilles, it was a long ride, took them most of the night, and no sleep was to be caught, no food was to be eaten until they got there. The hard life of a future Son.

They did however stopped for gas halfway there, in Lyon, she caught about four minutes of sleep on her bike while Tiges and Rain went to pay for the gas, despite the bright neon lights of the overhead roof-thing at the gas station, it was about five in the morning. What really woke her up first was Tiges on the phone after he came out of the gas station, he sounded like he was pacing back and forth near the door. But what made her open her eyes to immediately shut them was the smell of Playboy New York for men, the feeling of Rain's lips on hers, his relaxed face with eyes closed and his soft voice between the first two kisses.

-Wake up, biking beauty.

But that was all she had, three chaste kisses, Rain pulls away because Tiges was done with his phone call and coming back their way, and Rain probably had figured out how she would feel about fucking her way into the club. Her cheeks still stayed red until they reached Marseilles and Rain branched off towards his place as she followed Tiges to the club. Because each time she would calm herself down, Rain Queen would look her way with that face of his.

Once at the clubhouse, Jack was decent enough to ask news about Maddie, before telling her what she had to do. She had to go and rough up a dude that was refusing to pay protection to the club. Then Law came in and told her she looked like shit, especially wearing her Kutte over these ugly blue clothes from a cop station, she had no excuse to give to him, he had to already be aware that she had spent most of the day sleeping off in the tank.

-So who's the guy I'm roughing up?

-Michel Michaud. Pastry shop on Rue Loubon. Old owner just sold up and apparently forgot to tell the new owner how much it really cost to stay open around that neighborhood.

-Ok. I'm on it.

First, tough, she needed to get into some real clothes. Put a little bit of food in her stomach. Maybe sleep for twenty minutes. But it really needed to be taken care of early in the day. Pastry shops closed early.

It didn't take Everett long to head home. Seemed like forever in her state, but it was only a few minutes ride down the road. She parked beside her father's green bike, pulled herself up and headed inside, in the shade, it was hot and humid. Had she been home last night, she would have had the Rain Queen three day forecast, he did it just about every night at the club, so she would know if it would rain or not.

In the lobby, her mom, demanding to know why everyone had abandoned her. Happy didn't come home last night, she wasn't home last night, King hadn't came home, Everett just was in no mood to deal with that right now.

-Mom. Later, ok? Please.

The elevator, the door, the smell of pancakes, wait, what? Why did it smell of pancakes in her apartment? Instinctively, her hand clasped at where her knife should have been, but wasn't anymore, but it was too late, she was well on her way to the kitchen.

Her cat was purring, and a soft-spoken voice was talking to him, she peeked, it was Rain. In her kitchen. Making a few pancakes, bacon, eggs, toasts, the kind of breakfast she missed from America. The cat turned around and meowed at her, as if to say "bitch, it's about fucking time, did you know I pooped on your pillow while you were gone for two whole days and left me SO MUCH FOOD to eat in my bowl, and a fresh kitty litter, and the door cracked for me to go outside and the bathroom sink dripping just the intensity that I like it? What is your problem, human? You belong to me, and don't you fucking forget that!" Rain listened intently, before laughing. And Everett realized she never once hears Randy Coin laugh. And it was. Fucking. Sexy.

The cat fled as Rain was tackled onto the floor and, well, for lack of better words, taken advantage of. From the hallway, it mowed again "Why do you do things like that? I hate you! If you weren't feeding me to well and touching my head so much, I would run and never come back", but Everett didn't care. Busy she was, kissing and caressing and taking possession of what she judged now belonged to her.

It took a bit longer than the twenty minutes nap she was planning on, after, all, while they knew, they had never been so intimate, thus did not know each other's bodies, but it felt so good. It had really been a struggle for dominance for the second half that technically should have left her on her ass, but she felt good, good enough to throw some pants and a shirt on, head to Rue Loubon and take care of business.

-And you stay right here and keep breakfast warm, baby. I'll be back in an hour, I'm gonna fuck your little brains again, then we can sleep for half the day.

-Sounds good.

She laughed as she pulled herself up from the kitchen floor, the pancake in the pan had really burned well, the stove was still on but the pan now sat in the sink, probably chucked there by Rain in time to avoid the fire alarm. She rushed to her room and dressed up, before rushing back downstairs, she was starved, maybe she could catch a free bite at the pastry shop.

The bakery smelled brand new. Not old and moldy like the old owner. The guy behind the counter was in his twenties, already going bald, big teeth, not really good looking at all. There was another guy in the kitchen in the back, she knew him by face, he worked under the old owner. A ball of nerves that often got on her nerves, when she dated with a girlfriend nearby and would come here to get her lover a few sweets before going over. He used to work the counter.

She took her gloves off, kept her glasses on as she eyes the displays, there were macaroons, she reached in and ate one, it was decent. Cupcakes, she took a bite of one and tossed it over her shoulder, it was carrots, and she wasn't fond of that flavor. The guy behind the counter didn't notice her yet, he was busy making an old woman pay her purchases.

There was a display of tarts, she took bites into five of them before she was noticed by the guy in the back, who called to the guy in the front who was making small talk with the old lady.

-Ma'am, please allow me to serve you in a moment, please?

She raised an eyebrow, shot back that ma'am wasn't even her mother, reached for a big cake and grabbed a handful that she brought to her mouth, hmm, black forest with cherries. He took notice of her kutte, ushered the woman outside and started on how he was not going to be pressured into paying protection every month to a bunch of brutes, she listened with one ear, making a number on that cake icing on her hand before turning to him.

-Look, it's simple. You pay me now, I walk away, you don't see me before a month, and I leave you alone. Or you don't.

-Then?

-Then...

He had this bob of the head people have, when they want people to get on with a story, idea or thought, like a yes going downwards really fast, with the hands raised palms facing up, eyebrows furrowed, bref, a stupid look on his face. She smiled, lowered her hand on a chair that was at one of the bistro tables for people to have lunch there, literally swooped it over her head in a circular motion, and crashed it through the glass display of cakes, it all fell down in a pile of delicious and glass, with a topping of bistro chair.

-Then! 400, or I keep going!

-Are you insane?

-I think you know the answer to that.

-I'm not paying you!

-Are you sure? You locked the door. You're stuck in here, _with me_!

He yelled something in Spanish to the guy in the back, who came out with a bat, she was surprised that he actually help it properly, but it was no match for the pistol she had holstered under her kutte, he fell back, blood splattering against the pale blue wall, the bat clattered on the ground, the new owner looked at him, at her, at him again, before yelling that she was out of her mind, it made her smile.

-Yes, baby! I'm out of my fucking mind! Pay me! PAY ME!

She shot the phone when he went for it, broke the display of tarts on her way to get his hands on him and threw him out the front window and onto the sidewalk, opened the register and took all of one hundred and ten euros in it before trashing the rest of the displays and hightailing out of there. She wouldn't head to the club now, she'd lay low all day at home. With Rain. In bed. For some reason, it made her squeal like a teenage girl as she took the highway back home, the idea of spending the day in bed with the real Randy Coin.

Hundred and ten wasn't exactly the four hundred asked, but it was ten in the morning, and the guy had just opened up shop. They would probably ask for five hundred next month to make up for it. They always ended up paying.

Randy Coin! Randy Coin in her apartment, waiting for her. Rain Queen!

"Ermahgerd!" she squealed because no one could hear her.

-ERMAH FUCKING GERD! Randy COIN!

How sweeter could life get?


	7. Funny Bone

**So, this chapter will look like a filler chapter, but it's actually rather important for a future arc of this story. Well, a few arcs, actually! All of the SOA characters belong to Kurt Sutter, I just changed their names to French names. All of the original characters belong to me. Leave a reply, it would be much appreciated!**

 **Good to know: Porte D'aix is a monument in Marseilles that looks like a smaller Arc de Triomphe (that's in Paris).**

* * *

 _"Push! Push it, come on! Push it!"_

 _"I can't! It's too heavy!"_

 _"JUST PUSH IT!"_

-Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Her eyes snapped open as she was at the end of her scream, Rain was sitting down near her, jolted awake by her screaming, he had his pistol in his hand, ready to shoot anyone posing a threat to them. But there was no one but them and Rain's dog in Rain's rooftop condominium, even the fishes in the tank were sleeping. Immediately, he put the gun down and pulled her close, rubbing her hair. This was the sixth nightmare he knew that she had in the last three weeks.

"You wanna tell me about this one?" Randy asks, no. No fucking way. She never even told her diary about this one. All Everett wants is to be held. Rain quickly falls back to sleep, herself can't. She's sick of having nightmares. But she'll be damned if she gets back on all these pills she was on when she first entered adulthood. The only ones she missed anyways were the ones that sent her into deep, dream-less sleep. She would probably still take these if they didn't leave her so foggy all day long. It was ok when she was trying to live the accountant lifestyle, but now, no. No way, she was wide awake to the whole world.

However, if she tried just laying near Rain right now, and watch him sleep, she would just wake him up. So instead she crawled out of the large California King bed, put some underwear on and headed to the kitchen area, it was four in the morning, she made herself a coffee, that she drank watching the sunrise for a little while, until her phone rang, it was Joker.

-Yeah?

"Not waking you up, was I?"

-No. Just... Watching the sunrise. Nice isn't it?

"You sound quiet. Was'wrong with you?"

-Nothing. You just caught me early and undressed enough.

"Interesting. Where you at?"

-That, I'm not telling you. You'd be the last I would tell.

"You just said you were naked, you fucking tease!"

-I said undressed, not naked.

"Still enough for the wank bank."

-Tuh... Lefort, ew!

He laughed on the other end, as she felt Rain's lips against her neck, he jacked her cup of coffee and brushed her hair away from her neck before getting towards the kitchen, without a word about her flirtatious ways, firstly because then Philippe Lefort would know about them, secondly because he didn't really care, she was flirtatious by nature.

"I'm just teasing, kid. But seriously, how about you put some pants on, and I'll pick you up downstairs. In five minutes."

-I'm across town at a girlfriend's place.

"Porte d'Aix? That good for you?"

-Be there in twenty, what is it about?

"I just need a backup rider, Law said not to ride alone, it's way too early, and I trust you."

And that felt awesome, to have some people's vote of confidence, just like that, because they trusted her father when Happy said that she was good for it. That she wasn't just an hormonal female that would fuck up the delicate balance of a motorcycle club charter with her drama. So she hung up, geared up in the airy bedroom before going back for her coffee, Rain was making himself a light breakfast, he would probably put in a workout before opening up the gym.

-I'm heading out.

-Last I heard he was planning a long, out of country trip. Bring gas money and a passport.

-Doing what?

-Secret. He wouldn't tell. He'll trust you cause you aren't in the club yet, you don't exactly report to Law.

-Ok. Well...

She licked her lips, held on to the words that wanted to come naturally, Rain smiled, leaned down to peck at her lips, he whispered to be safe out there. Yeah, no I love you's there, either. It had only been two months. In the garage, her motorcycle, she loved the roars of it as she started it and pulled out, heading towards the rendez-vous point. Joker was already waiting, smoking a rolled cigarette with his helmet on the tank, she pulled beside him, took it and had a puff before giving it back with a few coughs.

-What in the hell is that? Arsenic in rolling paper?

-I knew you'd like it. Phone, please.

She didn't want to, but she gave it anyways, he popped the back and pulled the chip out before giving it back, the chip ended up under his heel on the ground. Whatever he was about to have her do with him, he did not want Juicy to be able to track them if Law ordered so. It made her wary, because it could mean that they were about to do something the club would not approve of, and also because wherever they were going, she would have no means to reach her backup contingencies if she ran into trouble.

She still put her phone back in her breast pocket, as Philippe was smiling at her, fastening his helmet on his head.

-We all have secrets, love.

He pulls away from the curb and heads North, she follows; they ride for eight hours, until almost mid-afternoon, they only stopped for gas and a sandwich near Lyon again, and a quick refill near Metz, they had almost ran out of France, and Everett was still in the dark when it came to their destination. It's only when they stop to cross the Zoufftgen border into Luxembourg that Joker tells her, probably only because the customs agent will ask, that they are going to Dudelange. She'd never been in Luxembourg in the first place. At least she was well traveled, it's not like it would be the first stamp in her passport.

From there, it was a short distance, at least she hoped, because she really needed a bathroom. At a red light, Philippe leans towards her, a smile on his face.

-Your father is the only person from the club I ever trusted enough to bring here. The only one in twenty-five years I've been a son.

-Well, thanks for the trust?

He nods, amused, and picks a right on Rue du Parc, goes on that street for a while before pulling in front of 2113, a nice white house, KL Esthetics reads a sign on the lawn, there's a black compact parked in the driveway, Philippe kills the bike and removes his helmet, she follows suit, gets off her bike, when the front door opens and two kids come barreling out of the house screaming and laughing and calling out in German. Papa, papa! Philippe Lefort was expected back home by a wife and three kids. It doesn't even take Everett by surprise, she's always pegged Joker for a family guy that had missed his shot at a family life. Pegged wrong, he just liked his biker life and his personal life to be two extremely distinct lives.

Philippe called back in German, as he took off his kutte and folded it, put it in one of his saddle bags, the youngest of the two kids had to be about four, he picked her up, kissing those big round, red cheeks, before turning to Everett.

-Can you take off your kutte for the weekend?

-I sure can, man.

-Now... You stay quiet about this, I can stay quiet about things I know.

-You know nothing, man.

-Which is why Martin still comes around twice a year?

She blushed, she couldn't even start to deny anything, she fumbles a few onomatopoeia as she is pulling her kutte off her back, she was ready to deny an affair with Rain from the bat, but this allusion to Martin had taken her way short. It makes Philippe laugh, as he's picking up the two kids, the second is a boy that's about six, his wife is now in the doorway, holding a tiny baby, can't be older than a few months.

-Now, there are accommodations for you in the back, it looks like a tool shed, but I assure you, it's very comfortable. And there are plenty of sights to visit in Dudelange.

Meaning, let me have my weekend and don't bother me, I'll let you know when I'm ready to leave. He just wanted to spend some time with his family. The small guesthouse in the back as a tiny functional kitchen and a bed, a TV with cable and WIFI, there's a photo of Sailor, Everett, Flo and King near the TV, a pad with some of her father's drawings on it, he hasn't been here in at least two years, or at least hadn't drawn here in two years. There's a mini-fridge filled to the brim with fresh food, it was all bought today.

Joker's wife is gorgeous. Everett spends most of her day watching them through the window, playing in the pool, Joker is a happy man. She's a statuesque green-eyed blond that speaks with a German accent, and the guy is head over heels for her, won't even let her get up to fetch the baby her milk, he's catering to her on hands and feet, it's quite contrary to the lazy fuck that's a Son in Marseilles. It's a sight to see Joker smile so much. What she gathers over the four days through conversations she hears through the open window is that Kikka was a prostitute in Munich and whoever owned her, they refused for her to go anywhere. Joker loved her, so he took her, brought her to Luxembourg where they would most likely never find her, put her in this house, gave her his name, and eventually, she loved him back. So she gave him three kids.

Then, after fours days spent in the guest house, Joker is ready to head back, after the kids were put in bed, Everett has to wait a while, sitting on her bike, for Kikka to be done making out with Joker, there, she keeps on saying she wishes he would stay.

-Hey Phil. On peux rester plus longtemps.

"We could stay longer", she offered, knowing his wife did not understand or speak French. He wished so too, he replies, but they've been gone off radar for too long. Law will have their heads. She had offered, but with the hope he would say no, sort of. Because she wanted to go back and see Rain. She was tired of sitting inside, doodling on her dad's pad and eating because there was nothing else to do besides pull-ups on the support beam and leg curls. She could have went out like Joker had offered, and see the sights, but she did not want to come back to a full backyard and his kids questioning who she was.

The ride back, Joker looks absolutely rested and happy and overall any positive adjectives she could have thought of. He looked love-drunk. And somehow, the four-day weekend gave Everett a lot of insight about the guy she thought she knew pretty well. He wasn't going on coke-binges, when he disappeared for a few days. During their stop in Lyon for a bite and gas, he reveals the full story. Kikka was a prostitute for the Munich charter, and when Joker asked to have her to himself, they said no. So he had went against his brothers, he sworn Everett up and down to total secrecy.

First stop in Marseilles, the clubhouse. Law was there, and he was absolutely livid of the disappearing act, Joker was fined three thousand euros for this new offense, and for getting Stars involved.

-Where did he take you?

Philippe looked elsewhere, and it wasn't the prospect of having the full story with Martin disclosed that made her lie. It was the prospect of her pal losing everything. She had no doubt Kikka would be returned to Germany if her existence came back to light. Philippe had went against SOA by taking Kikka out of the hole she had fell into. And he still went against his German brothers by keeping her hidden in Dudelange.

-We went to Spain for the hookers.

-What's wrong with the hookers here?

-Half of them are related to Joker in some degree.

Joker was doing everything he possibly could to hide his laughter, she was as straight-faced as she could be, as Law was staring a hole into her, he was livid.

-It's so hard to pick up the fucking phone?

-I was neck deep in pussy, I didn't hear it ring.

Now, Philippe was just openly laughing, it made Law even madder, he looked like he could punch the both of them.

-You. Get the list from my wife, and get my money. You, next time I suspend you, I'm not even kidding you. Get the fuck out of my face, both of you.

Everett fled, and went to find Emma Tellier-Moreau, the tall brunette was in the office of the clubhouse's pawnshop business, crunching numbers and bringing the accounting up to date, for once she didn't have her total bitch face on as she was struggling with the program Everett had downloaded her the year before.

-Good you're finally here. It won't let me go back to last year.

-Different file, you need to open the last year. CTRL and O, My documents, last year, I make a new one for every tax year, I told you that last year and the year before.

-I hate the new program. What'you want, baby?

-Law sent me for the protection list.

Emma sighs, looks around for said list as Everett waits, and when Emma hands her the list in question, she does so with her 1960's mentality speech of how a motorcycle club is no place for a woman, and how she should not even try. It makes Everett smile, drop a "I'll keep that in mind" before turning around and leaving, she doesn't care at all to piss Emma off. Emma is a non-treat to Everett. No matter how much pull she has behind the scenes because of her marriage to Law Moreau. Lawrence is the only one with final say as to what goes on in the gang. If Everett does prove herself to him, she will become a Son. Even if Emma thinks a woman's place is in the office/kitchen/wherever a woman was supposed to be in 1960.

On her way out of the pawn shop, Joker was waiting on his bike, he'd probably ride with her for most of the day, if he had nothing better to do. He was smoking the first cigarette she had seen him smoke since the one he had finished at Porte d'Aix, he chuckled and pulled her into a hug when she passed him.

-Neck deep in pussy, I like you. You're as fun as your father.

-Thank you. I get that from my mom.

-Running protection, today?

-Yup.

-Got you a new chip for your phone. You want company?

-Sure.

As long as she could shake him off by nightfall, so she could go and get laid herself. In the meanwhile, money was to be extorted from hard-working, well meaning people.


	8. Shake it like a pepper shaker

**Hiya there! Sort of filler chapter, because I can't have crazy-action in every chapter. So, little slice of life with Everett Lowman, but also important information for future arcs, keep your eyes open! The original SOA characters belong to Kurt Sutter, all OC are mine. And pop-culture references belong to their respective owners, and I make no money from this. Leave a little reply, if you feel like it!**

* * *

This was the worst punishment ever. By far the worst. Even digging up this guy, under the rain and with no help in the middle of the woods to change him location, only to be called by Lawrence two hours before sunrise that he had changed his mind again and the corpse could stay there wasn't as worst as this. It was hot, there was nowhere to catch shade, she was already burned to a crisp of the last four days of this, standing guard over a small warehouse she was not allowed in. Knowing Law, it was probably empty. Just another day in the doghouse for the disappearing act she did with Joker.

She hissed as she touched her red shoulder, she was so thirsty, she had ran out of water the previous day. And she was hoping for rain. Lots of rain. She had called Joker, and texted to no avail, to please get some water sent. Her mouth was so pasty. At least the night were nice and cool.

For the umpteenth time that day, she pondered the possibility that there might be a sink inside of the warehouse. One with running water. Shit, right now she was so thirsty, she may have had drank from the tank of a toilet. But she had to follow orders, even if it meant suffering. She was being punished, but she was being tested as well. How much pain and suffering would she allow herself to take for the club?

All the pain and suffering in the world. She would die for it, like about anyone else in the club. She would die for a shot at a patch. There was nothing more important in existence then that.

Around eleven in the morning, she started to hallucinate that she had a baby. Around one, when the heat got really intense and she was seeking shelter in the near lack of shade of the building, she tried to sing herself a song. Around three, there was three drops of rain that fell, but they may have been some bird piss.

* * *

It was a steady beeping that woke her up, her whole body hurt, she was laying on her back. Obviously a hospital bed. On the chair near her bed, Robert "Bob Seger" Manseau, reading a book, he looked up when she moved, prompting her to croak a very funny "did I diiiiiie?" that made him smile.

-No. Someone just forgot to pull you out of the oven.

-Or baste me.

-Juicy found you talking to God when he swung by coming back from his run.

-Talking to God?

-I don't have all the details, but you need to take it easy. Doctor's orders.

-Screw him.

Bobby laughed as she tried to push the blanket and get out of bed, but every movement hurt. She ended up in the exact position she had started, tough she was now glaring at him.

-Don't think that's how it works. You're pretty crisp.

-Get me out of here, Bobby, or I will hurt you. I want beer. I'll be a cheap drunk, for once.

He nods, helps her out of bed and into her own clothes before heading out of the hospital, his wife and son are waiting for them downstairs, Precious will drive Everett back to her bike. They were chatting while crossing the parking lot, Precious and Everett were holding Bobby's son Tiny's hands, crossing the four way intersection separating the sections of the parking lot when an orange Nova cut in front of them to head towards the hospital, way too close to actually be safe. A few inches and he would have hit Everett that was on the far right of them all.

-...just really hope he ain't gonna send me to guard a freaking warehouse in the sun again. That was brutal. Where am I gonna find Juicy, Bob?

-Probably Jack's new house, he was installing some security there. Watch out.

-I'm gonna have to go and see him, you know, ASSHOLE! To say thank you.

The driver hit the break a few feet away from them, slammed the car into park, Everett let go of Tiny's hand, Precious just kept on walking, Everett knew Robert would have her back. She turned around towards the car, waiting as the guy came out. He had quite a few inches on them both, and a few pounds on Bobby, but that wouldn't impress Everett.

-Bitch, you got something to say?

-I do you fucking asshole. You drive like a dick and you didn't do your stop, you almost ran us over.

-Shut your fucking mouth, you bitch.

She sighed, rolled her shoulders before rushing him and knocking him clean out, he fell hard to the asphalt as Everett stumbled over him not to trip and break her face, she regained her footing with a smile towards Bob when the doors of the car opened, and out came three guys just as big as the one she's knocked down. There was a second long stare down, during which Everett considered her options. No gun, no knife, not even a bat, and Bobby couldn't possibly shoot the three of them and get away with it, it was noon time in front of a busy hospital.

-Precious, start the car! Run, bobby! RUN!

They laughed as they rushed towards the section of parking they were in, chased by three big dudes. Bobby jumped on his bike and took off without a helmet as Everett jumped to climb on the trunk of Precious' car and getting in through the open sun roof. She was strangling with her laughter.

-Punch it, Precious! Run'em over! Haha! Go!

* * *

Everett thought the world could end now, and it would be just fine. She was laying on her stomach on top of a table, in the cool shade of the clubhouse, Rain was in her peripherals, taking each of the smiles she would address him while Joker was rubbing her back with some cold aloe Vera cream, it felt so good that she had lost all gulping reflexes and she just kept on drooling on the table. Worst had happened in this clubhouse, no one would say a thing. It couldn't be as worst as barfing on her own boots while in the drunk tank.

She was in the middle of a long moan of satisfaction when Lawrence came in with Jack and Hopie, he considered everyone that was inside, before lighting a cigar.

-Now, Stars, are you going to disappear for a week again, or did you learn that lesson?

-In honesty, with the massage I'm getting right now, I might do it again. Ask me again tonight, when I have to sleep on a kitchen chair again.

Law had a mocking laugh, and reached to poke her burned shoulder, it made her hiss at him, which made just about everyone laugh except for herself and Emma, who burned regularly when she tried to tan, and knew the pain.

-Isssh, asshole!

-Speaking of asshole, there's four big dudes outside waiting on you and Bob Seger. Apparently, you hit one of them.

-He almost ran us over, with Precious and Tiny. When I came out of the hospital yesterday. Whatever I did to him he got coming.

-Which one.

-Whichever asshole has a bruised cheek and the keys to a Chevy Nova. Richard Kiel looking motherfucker.

The guys around her just burst in laughter at the reference, she just closed her eyes and smiled again, she wasn't about to do anything about it.

-If they feel like waiting, I'll take them on later. Right now, I'm busy with my masseuse.

Joker slapped her behind the head playfully, before finishing her massage, Hopie went back outside to probably relay the message. When he came back in, Law called a church meeting, so Joker had to suspend the massage indefinitely, he was on the shit list, and whatever dirty job would come out of this meeting, he would have to do it, most likely. So Everett put her shirt back on and considered her options.

Option A) Staying in the clubhouse, and having to make conversation with Emma Tellier-Moreau. It wasn't a bad option in itself, Emma was a bright woman, but the potential subjects of conversation were very limited. Emma was just too catty and competitive, and while she considered most of the women around the club as her daughter/sisters, she had never really taken to Happy unless circumstances dictated so. There were neutral subjects, hair, makeup, clothes, but Everett felt more at ease having these conversations with her little sisters than with Emma.

Option B) Staying in the clubhouse and not having a conversation with Emma. That was a bad option. Emma would probably see it as being disrespectful if Everett sat there for a while without talking to her at all, or even look her way. Plus she would just come across as nosy about club's business, she hadn't been invited into Church for a reason, and that reason was right now, she was the muscle, not a full patch.

Option C) Slip out a side door. Aka, the coward's option. It would be the preferred option when it came to not stir shit around the club and clubhouse, but she wasn't one to have other people fight her fight. One for all and all for one, sure, but she was the one that clocked an asshole. No one here had told her to do it, so it was her own fight. Plus, if she took that option, Law would probably see her as a weak bitch that couldn't finish the fights she started. So that left her with;

Option D) Get out there and bust some heads. Get these assholes away from Law's doorstep, take care of her own business, and prove the club that she could do well in an unfair fight. Even if she lost. If she lost, they would pick her up, and help her avenge herself, but there was no shame in trying her hardest, even if this wasn't a Jackie Chan movie. None of them would make fun of her. Well, they would poke good-natured fun at her stupidity for getting into a fight alone against four big guys, she would probably laugh too, despite her broken bones, but they would let her stick around.

Everett had a deep sigh, looked at Emma for a moment, the woman was cleaning a counter near the bar, a scowl on her face Everett didn't think Emma realized having, she was just focused on her work. Or maybe she was straining to hear what the guys were saying inside of Church. That was a possibility. Half-Bag, a former prospect, had once told her that when the place was quiet enough and the guys inside spoke up enough, it was possible to make a conversation.

-Did you change your hair? It looks darker.

-Hm, I did. Thinking of getting highlights.

-Would look nice.

It was an odd conversation, even if it was just the start, Emma looked up, eyebrows furrowed at Everett over her glasses, it made them both chuckle. They both knew better. Everett wasn't into these kind of conversation, ever. She would tell females that they looked cute, but rarely were there specific compliments given, aside from "you have a nice smile", or the likes of.

-What was that?

-A little bit of option A) before I go out for option D). Maybe to talk me out of option C)?

-What are you talking about?

-You have a baseball bat? I have an asshole problem that needs taking care of.

No baseball bat, but that didn't mean there wasn't a wide array of blunt weapons to pick from around the clubhouse. Chain-locks, a shillelagh that had mysteriously appeared in the clubhouse eight years before, a naboot owned by a former member that had transferred and left it behind, enough paper to build a house out of Millwall bricks, hammers; it was the crowbar that Everett considered the longest, before deciding for it. She still tried to postpone the moment a little longer by stretching and warming up, before closing her hand on the weapon.

She hadn't even made a step towards the door that Emma stopped her, one hand on Everett's arm, she was handing her a pepper shaker.

-Be careful, out there. Take this.

-What do you want me to do with that?

-You can at least blind the biggest of these fuckers. Gives you a chance.

-Thanks. Don't let them kill me.

-Not all the way. Do me a favor. Never try to have hair conversations with me again.

-Deal.

They chuckled nervously again, and Emma let go of Everett, who headed towards the door, one eye on the camera, to determine which of the guys outside was biggest. That's the one who would get a full pepper shaker to the face. By the way they were waiting outside, it could work out pretty well.

She kicked the door with her foot as hard as she could, making one fall backwards after it him him square in the head, and the pepper shaker went flying at the biggest one of them, breaking in a lot of tiny pieces, he screamed out loud as she was swinging the crowbar towards the third. So far, so good.

Until she swung the crowbar back towards just about where the fourth guy was standing, and it hit... Nothing. Nothing but thin air, the guy had moved towards his pal that got a door across the head, and she had not anticipated that. She had somewhat played this out in her head at much faster speed then her actual one. And because she needed to turn around to look for him while swinging the bar, she was met with a fist to the face that sent her flying backwards and into a pile of trash bags. Something sharp poked at her back, she hissed, instead of screaming, she did not want to give them the satisfaction of screaming.

She still pulled herself out of there as quickly as she could, swinging her crowbar, it was now two and a half against one, much better odds, the guy she had hit in the head with the crowbar wasn't a hundred percent, and the guy that had gotten the pepper shaker to the face was screaming and bleeding profusely, he was of no use.

As she swung it again to hopefully get a hit on one of them, Jack ran out of the clubhouse, he had already done his assessment of the situation through the cameras, so he went for the biggest, she had imagined it would be Rain that would have come running out to help her. It was still help that was quite welcomed, as he tackled the guy from behind and into the side of a big garbage container. One and a half against one, odds she could easily overcome, she thought as she hit the already half-incapacitated guy in the jaw. Her and Jack against the guy she had clocked the day before and one of his friends.

They were taken care of in a matter of four to six minutes, and booted out of the compound without so much a fare-thee-well, once the door slammed behind them, Everett let herself fall on her ass to the ground dramatically, holding her face from that first punch she got.

-Asshole! Learn to drive!

-Are you fucking nuts?

-Why do people always ask me that?

But he wasn't even mad or angry, he was laughing. Only Everett Lowman would be stupid and or ballsy enough to go and take on four bulky, six foot two and over guys, all on her own, with a crowbar and a pepper shaker. He was holding his ribs, that's how hard he was laughing, leaning against the fence. And she was laughing just as hard, despite how much her skin and face hurt, as well as her back, from whatever had poked her.

-Aw. Come on, let's have a beer. You're as crazy as your fucking father.

-Thank you for the compliment.

They were still laughing as he helped her up and brought her back in, Joker checked on them both, whatever she had landed on in the garbage can had made a hole in her kutte and her skin, she would have a scratch, her face would be ok, given she put about two kilos of aloe Vera twice an hour until she wasn't burned anymore. She would be fine, perfectly fine. So she might as well get drunk.


	9. If It Walks Like A Pirate

**Just read it, please. I promise it gets better next chapter. I'm not satisfied either, but I promised chapter, and liked nothing at all of what I came up with today. I guess an insight into Sailor's business is better than no chapter at all? Everything belongs to their respective owners**

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Everett felt ridiculous. Really, really ridiculous, as she looked at her reflection in the mirror, she was dressed as a pirate, with a ton of makeup, the hat, boots and all. Fourteen of July -a national holiday in France- oblige, the whole family was enrolled for the busiest show of the year. Hell, the entire club overtime had been forced to trade their kuttes to don pirates outfits on this very day. It was one for the ages, said the flyers posted all around town and on the internet. The battles to end all pirate battles, nothing short of a war, but on water. The club always had fun, because it was just one day out of their year, then Sailor would make everyone a big barbecue at the clubhouse, and they would get drunk like pirates, but for the Lowmans, who were regularly forcibly enrolled into Mama Lowman's pirate business, the day was all but fun. It was their job to ensure the safety of everyone involved, while the rest of the crew, aka the club members and their wives all had the fun, along with the tourists on her mother's ship.

Sailor's regular boat, one of two used every day, was a replica of the Adventure Galley. The second boat, the one Sailor's boat usually defended against was a replica of the Queen Anne's Revenge. Few people knew that there was a third boat, the one kept for very special occasions. It was Everett that had ponied up a pretty penny with her mother to buy it and have it fixed, and Everett alone was captain of that ship. It was a replica of the Whydah, a former slave ship taken by pirates that had eventually capsized near the Bahamas. It was fully rigged for the adventure, and like every year, the whole club sat through eight hours of safety and technical classes, just for this six hour day. They worked with dull blades and safety harnesses, but the danger was there. At least, battles always happened on the deck and inside of the Adventure Galley. And there was the nightmare of insurances.

-You ready, or you're gonna spend all day hating the mirror?

-I hate mom.

-As you said every year for ten years.

She giggled lightly, before following her father out of their apartment, to head to the harbor. The show wasn't for three hours, but the Wydah left the harbor early, to get into their position, make sure everyone was ready, then wait for Sailor to call. Pump her crew of bikers to find their inner pirates. It was a beautiful day, the waters were fairly calm.

But while everyone sat and relaxed, she would run up and down the deck and double and triple check the harnesses and the rope lines, that everyone had proper attire, everyone could harness themselves on and off the ropes. She would be damned if someone died on her watch. They had never lost a single crew member, this year wasn't the year.

It was the same deal, every fourteenth of July. Sailor manning the Adventure Galley, and Happy and half of the regular crew manning the Queen Anne's, and Everett, the club and a few extras manning the Whydah, on which no tourist ever set foot. The battle always happened on the deck of the Adventure. The day would start as regular-boring on the Adventure, then suddenly they would get "attacked" by the Queen Anne's revenge, half of the hired crew on the Adventure would go fight half of the hired crew on the Queen's, and half of the Queen's crew would go and fend off the tourist-pirates on the Adventure's deck. That was the regular adventure. A carefully planned choreography for the most part, all "swords" were dull. A few of the hired crew had pistols that shot blanks for dramatic effect, like the captain and the first mate.

But on July fourteen, once the battle was well underway between the two ships, Everett and the Whydah would come crashing in, like it was a genuine band of pirates coming in for a real battle. She enjoyed the special day even less than she enjoyed a regular day working for her mother. She worried from the first hour to the last.

She was checking on the pneumatic system that inflated when she almost crashed into the Adventure to board when Rain came down, she smirked at his attire, he'd went for Jack Sparrow, as her second mate.

-Cute.

-Your mom called. It's time.

-I hate it more and more as I get older.

-I think Maddie is really enjoying herself, I could hear her scream pirate-lingo as you mom called it in.

-Born pirate. Ok. Tell everyone to get ready? I'll be up in a second.

He nodded but stayed there as she finished, only to catch her by the waist and kiss her gently, he whispered to calm the heck down, after so long, even if it was only once a year, the guys would be OK to do the act for about twenty-five minutes. They all knew the harness system, and how to very quickly release themselves once they got on the deck of the Adventure, and Rain had rigged the cannon system himself, along with Juicy and some professionals hired by Sailor, they both knew how to work it to shoot blanks like the back of their hands. If Rain was to get "shot" during the act, Juicy knew how to work them.

-I still hate today.

-Well, I love you, Ev.

Her heart beat faster, she wondered if she was blushing.

-I love you, too, Randy.

-Well, let's all love each other, because that's the best way to get caught by Lawrence, Stars. Come on.

Rain and Everett both startled, hearing Joker's voice booming, he was leaning in the doorway looking at them, a huge smile on his face, he slapped his hands twice to hurry them along. Rain chuckled, left ahead, as Everett checked her hair and her hat, Philippe smiled at her when she walked past him, promised to keep the secret, as she thought he would.

Up at the helm, she radioed that she was on her way, and headed to the coordinated Rain had noted down. It wasn't too long that she could see them, the wind was in her favor.

The boarding went without incident, even if her crew got absolutely massacred by the tourists and her father's crew, as the ultimate bad guys, they retreated with a few booms of the cannons and only seven crews, herself, Rain, Law, Emma, Tiges, Alessandro Montel and a crow eater that had miraculously escaped the mayhem. Juicy had "died" from a gunshot to the chest as planned, still tied to his rope, twenty-five feet in the air, she had seen him doing his best to stay still. Most of the crew would be "thrown at sea" from the Adventure's deck, the Adventure would leave right away, and the dead crew on the Queen Anne's would pick them up straight away.

As soon as they were far away, she heard Juicy scream for them.

-We lost Joker! And Jack! and Bobby! Holy fuck!

-Rain? Help Juicy down, please? And I'll have you know I saw my dead siblings.

-I thought Maddie always lived? Did I not see her alive just before we left?

-Nope, she's on mom's shit list for some reason. She got shot by dad. Good job, guys.

-Thanks, Everett. I lost my footing there, coming back on this ship, I was so worried I wasn't harnessed properly.

Everett stays quiet, it's pretty impressive to hear Emma Tellier-Moreau say these kind of words, that she was worried. Or thank you for that matter. Or admit she almost broke her face. All costumes were taken off and stored in the captain's cabin, it was in regular clothes that Everett brought the boat around the island of Corsica to head back to Marseilles, that usually gave the victorious crew of tourists on the Adventure enough time to celebrate their victory in true pirate fashion, at the fake tavern, and then enough time for Sailor to send them on their way elsewhere so all boats could come back to port. Lawrence and Emma took that time like every year to have their platter of wine and cheese, Juicy stored the cannons properly with Rain, and Tiges cleaned the deck before coming to sit near her to chain smoke together. They were always the ones or so to survive, Emma and Law for being head of the club, Rain and Juicy because of the cannons.

Once back in port, all kuttes were put back on, all the tourists were gone, and everyone had returned safely, in the crew. Sailor had kind words for everyone that helped, she was really glad to have pulled it off again this year, and she lead the way back to the clubhouse for the barbecue, everyone went, except Everett that wanted to double-check everything on her boat that would need maintenance, she had put just too much money into it to not care. She had noticed some harnesses would need to be replaced, she wanted to mark them down. Probably take care of it over the winter. It was dry docked and transported to a huge warehouse about three hours away.

She had halfheartedly expected Rain to sneak back to the port at some point. Maybe to take the boat out again, and check out the stars, make out the best of it being in the water now. Have something to drink, like the tequila she had bought the night before, and some sandwiches. It was however Herman Losique that came back, for what, she had no clue, she still hadn't cracked the code of his language, but it was clear he wanted a good fuck. He wasn't trying to be an asshole about it, but he had shown up with booze, and for what Everett had gathered, a similar plan to hers to chill on the sea. She tried to turn him down in all the languages she knew, as nicely as she could, he just kept on talking in that shit language he spoke in. So she retorted to "no", the only word coming out of her mouth. After ten minutes, Losique just started cracking up, he ended up bursting in laughter, before addressing her in an impeccable English.

-Can you stop being so adorable?

-What?

-You're trying so hard to be nice. Why not just tell me to fuck off?

-You're an asshole. A fucking asshole.

-Eh. Rain let me in on the little secrets, there. He's tied up in club business, but told me to go care for his lady that was probably waiting for him. And hands off.

-Club business?

-Law. Being Law. They're doing a run, and I wasn't invited for being the weird dude that speaks no language. Randy suggested I forcibly get you to ride bitch on my bike, and take you for a nice meal far enough that people don't know I'm not supposed to speak English, or French, for that matter.

-Do you know I just spent most of my time avoiding you because I had no clue how to talk to you?

-Worked, didn't it?

She laughed, turned her back to return to the task at hand, Losique said something she didn't understand because it was said in that weird tongue he always spoke in, and she was grabbed by the arm and tossed on his shoulder like a sack of potato, to be brought to a nice restaurant, whether she liked it or not.


	10. Secrets

**Short chapter full of mystery, that I am really, really satisfied with! I'm sorry about the last two chapters, I'm still not feeling them, but at least they lead to this (in my opinion) great chapter. So, Kurt Sutter owns everything SOA, and I own my own original characters. Enjoy! Happy father's day!**

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She never thought something like this could make her so upset. Maybe she'd just been fooling herself for the past almost six years, and she was still in love with him. Martin. She couldn't even see the road, and this dress she had been convinced to wear seemed... Wildly inappropriate and out of character. She hadn't even worn a dress on her wedding day.

* * *

Seven hours ago, Everett had let Rain convince her to put on a mini-dress and ride bitch with him to Saint-Tropez, home of good nightclubs and two hours away from home, he had brought her to a fancy restaurant, then to dance. Dancing was something she liked, to an extent. But no one knew them or their stories. She loved that about Rain. He didn't mind to almost never see her in Marseilles anymore, just at the club. If he wanted to take her out, he found places they could go out anonymously.

And at this club, she was pretty much having the time of her life, being nearly twenty-six years old; Randy was a surprisingly good dancer. She felt like a whole other person, smiling and laughing and being so openly flirty. And "Randy-that's-not-wearing-a-kutte-and-doesn't-have-to-think-about-the-club-first" was pretty delightful to be having around. Whole other person, too.

Then around ten thirty, her phone had rang. She had made clear to the boys at the club that she was going to see a girlfriend and should not be bothered under any circumstances, she had made Jack swear up and down that he would not let Lawrence call her anyways. She had made her father swear that no one would call from the Lowman clan either. She wanted this weekend for herself, she had literally spent thirty-nine days with the club for business. Now she wanted two days on her own.

Rain had a sexy growl. "Don't answer it", it had been enough to convince her, they would probably take a hotel tonight, and have a good time.

But then she went to the bathroom, and had checked the voice messages that had been left for her on her voicemail. She had missed two calls, she'd only felt her phone ring once.

"Stars, it's Lawrence. Hôpital of La Conception in the fifth just called looking for you, they wouldn't leave me any information. They just left a number and said it was an emergency. I just checked on your family, your parents and siblings are all well, so I don't know what it's about. Call them back, the number is..."

She pressed eight, to listen to the next message, she had a bad feeling about this.

"The message is for Everett Lowman-Depardieu, this is nurse Céleste Pruneau from Hôpital de la Conception. Your husband Martin Depardieu was just admitted in intensive care, and you are listed in his file as his emergency contact. If you could contact us as soon as possible, or come in person, so that..."

She snapped the phone shut, tried taking a few deep breaths, to calm herself down, but it wasn't working, Nothing could happen to Martin, it was impossible.

Breathing, not working, she bounced off the closed toilet seat so quickly that she almost ran into the closed stall door, she swung it open, there were three girls at the sink, they all turned around as Everett kicked these stupid heels off and almost ran out of the bathroom. Rain was waiting at the bar, it was the first time she didn't care to linger on his sexiness.

-Hey, babe, wh...

-You need to drive me back home, right now.

-What's the...

-NOW, Randy!

He had, even if she had no shoes, no jacket, nothing, he just drove back to Marseilles, and dropped her off in front of the hospital, she didn't even look at him, she bounced off the seat and rushed inside, got lost twice before finding the ICU, she never came to this hospital before, she went to Private Beauregard, across the city. She spoke to a million different people before finding the right place. She almost crashed into the nurse's station, bellowing her husband's name. The nurse looked, before asking her to take a seat, she had to tell Everett three times before Everett complied.

Then a doctor came over, big, old serious dude, who offered his condolences. Martin had died about an hour before, as a result of his injuries. He fell into one of the big machines at his job, showed up at the hospital in an ambulance pretty banged up, and they couldn't save him. His injuries were far too extensive and he hadn't been responsive at all, blood loss and whatnot. And all Everett could say was "no, no, he's not dead. He can't be. I'm counting on him. Because I can't do it. He can't be dead."

And the doctor kept on telling her that yes, he was dead, and did he have parents that she should contact? No. His sister was dead for twenty-five years, he didn't speak to his mother because "it was her fault" and he had a very strained relationship with his father. She just sat there crying. For hours.

No. No, she wasn't still in love with Martin. She'd always loved him, yeah, sure, maybe as a friend if he hadn't been so stuck on her coming back and making shit work, but she'd always been just too much of a free spirit. Plus, that life came with responsibilities she had never wanted.

Shit. Martin was dead. Martin that could not die. Martin that she had pushed away to keep intact. Even if he came around about twice a year to try and beg her to come back.

Day was breaking when Joker and Rain found her still crying in a waiting room halfway between the intensive care and oncology units. After almost eight months since their moment on the roof of her apartment building, Rain had learned not to touch her when she was having her moods. So he just sat near her and waited. Joker on the other end wasn't her boyfriend or lover or anything, he just grabbed her, ans asked her what was wrong. She looked at the two of them in turns, the most important men in her life after her father. She had to get some shit off her chest.

-I have a secret I need to tell someone.

-You wanna tell us?

-Not really. But there's no one I trust more. Except dad.

-What is it, bug?

Usually, she would have winced at Rain for the nickname that she did not really affectionate, but this morning, she wipes her nose, her cheeks before sitting straight.

-I always told everyone that I married Martin to piss dad off. That wasn't true.

-Why did you, then?

-I married Martin, because...

* * *

Rain had been quiet since he had called her Bug. He seemed to be dissecting the pretty vital piece of information Everett had just shared for the first time in six years, his face was blank. Joker was rubbing his forehead, he was best placed to understand her nightmare.

-Did he...?

-No.

-You?

-Never, no way.

-So who?

-I'll have to call Jocelyne, his mother. I'm not. I can't. You see me doing it?

-Hell no.

They were silent for a moment, Randy took a deep breath, before putting a hand on Everett's knee, it made her look his way.

-Us doing it wouldn't be in the card, hm?

-Never, Randy. It would mean coming clean, and I just... Can't. Ever. It was supposed to be a secret I took to my grave. Now the mother-fucker died.

-How can I help, then, Bug?

-By never bringing the subject up, again.

She could feel herself tearing up again, she had no clue how to deal with all of this. Martin surely was so much better at it than she could ever hope to be. Martin was near perfect. At least in her eyes. Still. Rain had a serious nod, he would never bring it up again, and she knew it. Joker offered his help, in any ways it could be required, but she declined. That was some shit she needed to deal with on her own. She knew the white-lies Martin had told his family, or what was left of it in Paris, and sending Joker would just destroy the illusions they had. She had to call Jocelyne herself.

-Where are you going to bury Martin?

-I hum...

She has to dig up old memories, to remember if they ever discussed this particular scenario where she would bury him, but she didn't recall that they ever did. She ends up shaking her head.

-Probably with Lili, his sister. I'd have to talk to Jocelyne about it. Could Juicy find her phone number, without being nosy about it?

-Yeah. I'll call you in an hour.

-Thanks, Phil.

Joker nods and leaves, she remains there, sitting near Randy that looks very much like he would want to fight what's been decided, fight to get involved, but won't, because she asked him not to. Because getting involved against her will would mean losing her, and possibly get shot in the head for making sure the secret died with him.

Getting it off her chest did not make her feel any better. It just made her want to curl up in a corner and cry herself to death. Stupid twenty-years old Everett. Twenty-five, almost twenty-six years old Everett wished she could murder twenty-years old Everett for her stupid, very, very stupid life choices.

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 **What do you guys think the secret is? Give it a good thought and leave me a review with your theories! It will be revealed in the epilogue chapter that will be posted in mid-august!**


	11. The chapter with no title

**Happy Tuesday! Here's chapter 11 for you all to enjoy. Kurt Sutter owns everything SOA, and I own my own characters, and anything else is owned by their respective owners and or creators. Leave a word if you feel like it.**

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It was an absolute torture but to have Martin's mother Jocelyne right there. She was a sad and tearful woman who had now lost both of her children to stupid as hell accidents. She kept on how Martin had loved Lili and hated Jocelyne, and Everett didn't really want to hear about it, but it was clear that the woman didn't have a lot of people to talk to back home. She rehashed the story of how Lili died for the seventeenth time in the three days she had been in Marseilles, a moment of inattention and the six years old little girl had ran into oncoming traffic to chase her balloon that had rolled away, bam. Died on impact. Everett so did not want to hear it again, but she couldn't bring herself to interrupt.

At least they were now standing beside Jocelyne's car, on the backseat of which Martin's belongings were all piled up and ready to go, along with the secret, Everett had to hold her breath to stay calm and steady, she wanted Jocelyne to leave before someone saw.

-You're such a sweet girl, a good girl for my Martin. Don't worry about a thing. We'll all be waiting for you in Paris when you're done selling the house and everything.

Everett had a pale smile and a nod, Jocelyne, like a lot of people around the club and France, didn't speak English. The translation was automatic, after all these years. It would come out of her interlocutor's mouth in French, enter her ear in English, then her own thoughts would come down from her brain in English, and come out of her mouth in French.

-Thank you. I'll do my best to be quick. I don't care how much it sells for. I just want to go back to Paris.

-We'll be waiting for you.

A nod, another one of these damn hugs that smelled like sweat and cigarette and Jocelyne got into her car and left. Everett had a blank expression watching it roll away, before having a sigh of relief. It was gone. It would never come back. She would never go to live in Paris again, Maddie had one year of college to go before she came back home. The house was already sold, Emma and Lawrence were buying it for Jacques, cash, and Everett would just send the money to Jocelyne, it didn't belong to her, it belonged to Martin's family. They needed it a lot more than Everett ever could.

Widowed wasn't exactly how she had wanted this marriage to end, but one way or another, it was over and done with. She still didn't believe the balls Martin had to have put her in his hospital contacts under both of their names, she had always made it clear it had been a nightmare to change her name from Kearns to Lowman, her true name, and her husband would need to be a hell of a guy to make her go through that legal nightmare again. Martin was sweet, but he'd always been a little bit of a vindictive asshole like that.

Her dad and Lawrence had been trying to convince her to just keep the money from the house, but it had never been hers. She had never lived here, never put any money in it, it had been Martin's house. She may have moved out of her parents' house at seventeen, she had never lived with anyone but herself, firstly across town, then in the same building where she pretty much lived for free and jacked her neighbor's internet and cable. She had no use for the money. His family could use the money to bury him, and all. Even if Jocelyne had been put under the impression that Everett had lived there for the duration of their wedding.

She had to get to work, before Emma and Jacques came to see the house for themselves, they had only seen photos so far. The photos that she had told Jocelyne she wanted to keep had to be shredded and burned, the wallpapers had to be steamed off in two of the bedrooms, and all of the walls had to be cleaned right off. Evidence had to disappear. Only then could she head back home and get her cuddles from Rain that she hadn't seen in five days. He had grumpily agreed to stay away.

Once everything that was evidence was destroyed, she sat down in the kitchen, staring at that corner of the counter she would often sit on, eating soup-in-a-cup at the end of long days of school or work, wearing just boy shorts and tanks, while Martin would cook something more substantial, back when she was in love with him, or at least thought she was, because what the fuck do nineteen year old girls know about love? Nothing more than twenty-five, pushing twenty-six years old girls did. She was in lust with Randy for sure, in love, not so much. She thought she was, but it would probably take time to know. Love is not something you know for sure after only eight months. At least not at her age. Not that she was questioning her love for Randy. Everett never wanted to be without him.

She had always found the symbolic of cutting one's hair ridiculous. Or at least not very serious. You cut your hair because it bothers you, not because you want to send a message. Because you don't want to be able to be identified is another pretty good reason. Jocelyne could point out a tall blonde with long hair and grey eyes that dressed preppy. So the contacts would be thrown out, Everett thought as she pulled her hair in a ponytail and cut off anything that came out of the elastic, hair grew back. The handful of nine inch long hairs was thrown in the fireplace, Everett watched it burn before looking at the time, it was five, Emma and Jack would be here any minute. She wanted to make sure nothing was out of place around here. Burn these clothes she was wearing and put back her jeans and kutte.

Everett was in the attic when she heard Emma's voice downstairs, she let herself down and smiled, half of her hair had escaped the elastic, falling around her face, it made Emma stare for a moment, before reaching for Everett's face and pushing a strand behind her ear.

-You should have asked Precious if you wanted a haircut. She would have done a better job than dull scissors.

-You know me, I'm too impatient.

-I know, baby. It looks cute. How are you holding on?

-Uh, stereotypes about mothers in law? Jocelyne left this morning, I only started breathing once she left.

-Well, we moms can sometimes be overbearing. It's always harder when we only have one son.

Everett blushed and turned around, she started towards the kitchen, pointing out the original wood trimmings and ceiling lights, giving a tour of the house, she did not want a discussion with Emma. Emma was too good at prying secrets and information. The flooring in one of the bedrooms, original, the bathtub on legs, too, plumbing had been done in the last ten years, roof was due, soon. Emma was satisfied, and gave up the second half of the money, they would go to the notary soon to conclude the sale, once Everett went to take officially possession of the house, Martin had a will and left her everything he owned. In the meanwhile, she did not care at all if Jack started to inhabit the house.

Everett didn't know if she should laugh or cry, when she got to the apartment building and found her father and Rain sitting together in the lobby, watching the girls go by with a beer. Rain wasn't someone that was usually loud or anything, but it was funny when he first saw her, pointed at her and exclaimed "Oh, that's one I want to fuck" and Everett's father shot him a look that could absolutely kill someone.

-That's my daughter, you fucking asshole.

-I mean, gently make love to.

-Still murdering you. Asshole.

-Has he got you to play kill fuck marry, now?

Rain stands up with a nod, wraps his arms around her into a hug, it feels so good. And she hears a whispered comment that he likes her hair. She just wants to go upstairs, have something to eat, smoke a few cigarettes and have some wine, take her clothes off and maybe play touch-a-pee pee. Randy squeezes, when she looks up, he's smiling down at her, before turning to Happy.

-No, not at all. This one, I would marry.

Happy just looks on, face blank or so, but Everett can read approval in her father's eyes. He had said no for Martin, and Dan, and Kris when she had been engaged to him briefly, but Randy Coin would be a yes in Happy Lowman's book. Everett blushes, she has butterflies to hear Rain say that, he'd always sworn out of marriage since it had always been a failure to him, then again, he always married chicks that knew nothing or or wanted nothing to do with the club. Everett knew that life. She had grown up in and around it, she knew the ugly side of it.

After a hug goodnight to her father, she heads upstairs with Rain, he's nice enough to give her a heads up, he's going to fight night later. He's not bringing her. He just wants to go alone. So if she's sleeping when he leaves, that's where he's going. She could go on her own if she felt like it, but she'd go back home alone.

During their cuddles, he starts speaking of her birthday next month. She's going to turn twenty-six years old. Is there somewhere she would want to visit? A place she always wanted to go to? He wanted to take her. Just pack a small bag, hop on their bikes and hit the road. If it was in another continent, they could always get loaner bikes from a local club. He had never traveled outside of club business. So he had visited very few countries. Spain, the UK, Belgium, Germany. He had flown to China once as a child. That was it.

-How about Italy? I never went, not even in high school. We went to Canada for my eleventh grade trip.

-Ok. We'll go to Italy for a while.

-And when you turn forty-five, we're getting on a plane.

-What plane?

-Any plane. We get up in the morning, have heaps of sex, pack a bag, head to the airport and head out the first flight that we can get two tickets from.

-Are you making plans for three years from now?

-Maybe.

He sighs, pulls her closer, it makes her all happy and fuzzy. Rain is so strong and manly. And he's rubbing her hair, a surefire way to put her to sleep, and he knows it, often takes advantage of it. Especially when he wants to get out of conversations. It's a funny feeling tough, to feel his fingers on the nape of her neck for the first time, now that she has short hair. Once her breathing evens out, he leans towards her, and whispers in her ear.

"I sure hope that plane we'll take will bring us somewhere warm. You know I don't like the cold, bug."

* * *

It sure had been the best night of sleep Everett had gotten in a while, even if Rain had sneaked out of bed around ten, ten thirty to go to fight night. He hadn't came back, but it didn't matter, his pillow smelled of him. She hugged it, with her nose against it for a while, before rolling out of bed with energy she hadn't felt in a while, in the buff she crossed her apartment, put some water to boil for a coffee before getting herself in the shower, she had plans for the day. Plans that involved Joker and Juicy, club business and a visit to the Barcelona charter.

She even broke into some random singing in the shower, before passing her short bathrobe, pulling her wet hair into a tiny ponytail, she made herself a coffee and went on the balcony to enjoy the sunrise with her cat that was lounging in a cat hammock. That thing was spoiled to shit. Downstairs on the parking, she counted three bikes. Hers, her father's, and while it was pretty dark and she was on a high floor, she suspected it was Joker's from the way it was parked. Joker never bothered to back up properly into a parking space. He just went head first. He was probably on his way up.

He knocked and let himself in, she was busy petting her cat between the ears, Mittens was purring with so much content he was drooling on his paws.

-As always, with no pants.

-I just showered. Isn't that right, Mr. Mittens? Yeah, isn't that right? Human took a shower. So now Human doesn't smell so bad.

Everett startled from Joker's proximity, he had his nose at the crook of her neck from behind, sniffing inquisitively. He made a comment that it indeed didn't smell so bad, Everett laughed and jerked her elbow in his gut before heading to get dressed before Juicy arrived. Joker was asking how it was going with Rain, she didn't have much to say about that. That Joker knew didn't mean she wanted to be open about it. So she countered by asking him when he was going back to Dudelange.

-Next month.

-Can't. Going to Italy for my birthday.

-Shit.

-You can have them come down here and they can stay right here. Dad knows. He'll keep an eye on them and you know it.

-It could get to Law's ears.

-Not with mom and dad. Just get Kikka and the kids to come. Even if for a weekend. You taking two separate days to drive them here, then back will be less suspect than taking a whole week to go up there.

-I'll see.

-If you decide to, dad has the keys for the door.

She downed a big gulp of coffee while crossing back to the kitchen with a shirt on, jeans unbuttoned and with no socks on, she needed to take her no-baby pill, for peace of mind. For now, because no doctors in their right mind would neuter a twenty-five years old woman, even if she begged and groveled for it. Not before she would be at least thirty. Socks, boots, her pants zipped and buttoned, her kutte and keys, her cellphone that chimed with a text-message from Juicy, who was downstairs waiting for them.

-So, Law gave you the instructions or what? Do I get to hurt someone?

-Just enforcers, they have problems down there and could use the help.

He smiled as she holstered her pistol under her kutte and made sure she had her knife, she took her helmet from the hook behind the door and opened up while talking.

-Well, he picked the right ones. the ones with no fucking brains.

-We're not paid to think, that's Lawrence's job.

Her laughter was cut short by the sight of Esther in her wheelchair on the other side of the door, bag on her lap and looking like a freaking beagle with her baggy-eyes and droopy mouth. Her eyes lit up for a second to immediately dim again at the sight of the motorcycle helmet and kutte, and Philippe that was holding the door for Everett, and looking down at her wondering what kind of fucking creature that was.


	12. Esther

**It made me sort of sad to write this. Kurt Sutter owns his own stuff. Leave a review?**

* * *

"To a job well done!"

Everett smiled at Jack, clanked her bottle of beer with the rest of them and had a long sip of the lukewarm beverage, she hadn't cared to put her beer in the fridge when they got back from Spain. She wasn't staying long enough anyways. But hey, the beef between Barcelona and their rivals had been squashed, no one had lost their lives, thanks to Everett and Joker's mediation skills, Charming's mother charter had called to say they were happy, Lawrence was happy, Jack was happy. Everyone was happy. Disaster, averted.

She had just gotten up to leave when Lepage called from the couch where he was slumming with two crow eaters, a smug look on his face.

-Hey, Stars? When are you gonna jump on my dick?

The whole room immediately went silent, half of them were looking at the new prospect like they could murder him, the other half were looking at her expectantly, waiting to see what her retort would be. She couldn't keep them waiting or they would think that this kid got to her.

-Hey prospect? When you you gonna jump on mine?

She mimicked stroking at her crotch then popped her hand open graphically, a mock look of climax on her face, before flipping him the bird, she wasn't going to let him disrespect her. There was light hazing, and there was shit you better just not say; that was some shit he should have kept his mouth shut for. At least her retort made the guys laugh, nothing she couldn't handle.

Lawrence caught her by the door, partly to commend her on the work she had done enforcing in Barcelona, partly to ask her how come she was leaving so early, he had found her someone to fight for fight night, plus he wanted to peg her against the prospect that Jack was sponsoring. Law knew Stars could probably take him without problem. Everett was Happy Lowman's daughter after all.

-I can't. I have a cockroach problem I got to go take care of.

-Isn't that your father's problem?

-Yeah, no. He came into that vagina, but he didn't come out of it. My problem.

-Oh. Bobby. Bob.

The man looked up from his hand of poker, put it down and got up from his chair as Law gestured for him to come over, he pushed his glasses on top of his head as he stopped by them, pulling up on his jeans.

-Yeah?

-Go with Lowman. She could use someone to keep her cool-headed. No cops.

Bob's eyes goes from Law to Everett a few times, as if this simple motion could help him understand why, he pulls his glasses down with a nod, before Everett can really refuse the offer or the help. It was her problem and she would take care of it. Bobby follows her outside, gets on his own bike and leads the way out of the courtyard of the clubhouse, because he's higher ranked than she is. He knows where she lives.

But instead of heading there, he heads to that bar she used to serve cocktails at, there's a long line, but she's worked there long enough that she can skip the line, the bouncer easily remembers her. Bobby gets them a table upstairs on the mezzanine overlooking the dance floor, asks the waitress for two beers before turning to Everett.

-I saw that look on your face when Law asked me to tag along. What's the problem exactly?

-I'm not sure. My birth mother showed up, as we were leaving for Spain. Didn't talk to her at all. Basically told her to stay out of sight and not even look my cat's way. I'm killing her tonight, Bob.

He raised an eyebrow at her resolve, she had said it and she meant it. There would be no more Esther showing up unannounced, or calling crying for help.

-Did she tell you why she came?

-No. And I don't care to know. When I went to Seattle last year, I told her if I saw her again, I was killing her. I can't go soft now?

The waitress comes back over, puts the two beers on the low table, in that awkward position the creep boss liked and told the girls to use, ass pointing one way, knees awkwardly bent and her tits pointing straight at Bob Seger's face, he had an eyeful before paying her, she smiled and left, Everett looked at her, licking her lips before having a long swig of her beer.

-So what's the plan?

-For dad not to see her, or know that she's there at all. If he'd seen her, he would have called me already. Or mom. Mom would have called me to tall me that dad went crazy because Esther is in my apartment.

-You look sad, when you're telling me this.

Did she? It wasn't even sadness, it was lassitude over a situation that had been going on for almost twenty-seven years, ever since Esther had slipped out the back-door after dropping a pregnancy-bomb on her dad as the cops were barging in through the front door. Then Esther had tried to keep Everett from Happy for nearly a decade. Until he'd left her for dead in Rogue River.

She has a look at the dance floor, with the thought that the people down there dancing like robots on the stupid dance music puked by the speakers were sad and pathetic. That wasn't even a nice life, that nine to five just to afford one night on the town a week. And to say she was trying to assimilate to these people, at one time of her life. How stupid could she have been to...

-Everett!

She managed not to startle as she turned to Bob who was looking at her still, hands around his beer like he was trying to strangle it.

-If you need me to not go up there with you... I can stay in the parking lot, and Law will never know.

-I don't know. I don't have a plan, Bob. You and Joker are the only ones knowing for sure that she's there. And Law, but he's not gonna rat me out to dad. And even if he does, she'll be long gone cold by then.

-So you're serious about this.

Everett just nods. Did she not look and sound serious about this? She takes one last gulp of her beer as she stands up from the comfortable lounger, last washed circa 1990, puts the half-full bottle down on the table and considers it for a second, before puking a piece of truth to Bobby.

-I've been fucking Rain Queen for about a year. He's at my place at least two times a week, and he knows nothing of my mother. He's probably gonna show up after fight night, and I'll be damned if he sees the pathetic meat sack that birthed me.

She looks down at him, he's staring a hole through her legs, hands crossed on his knees, pauses for a moment before looking up at her.

-So we're on a deadline, then.

Oh, can she ever appreciate how simple Bob can be, most of the time. And a real bonus to Robert Manseau is that the guy was a real tomb. Her secrets, her dirty, shameful little secrets were safe with him. He let her lead the way to her place, parked near her and followed her inside, Sailor was in the lobby mopping, she interrogated as to Bobby's presence on a Friday night, she dropped a hint about Rain and their relationship, almost like a question.

-No, mom. Bobby's just picking up some shit to bring to storage.

-I could have done that for you while you were gone.

-Club storage, ma.

The elevator closed before Sailor could add anything, they were silent on the ride up to Everett's floor. She was left with her thought about her confession to Bob. She truly was ashamed of Esther, and genuinely thought Rain could think less of her if she saw that weak piece of shit that had raised Everett until Happy and Sailor got her custody. Daughter of an unrepentant murderer and a pirate was much better credentials in her book than daughter of an unrepentant murderer and a weak ass drug addict her father had failed to kill correctly. She trusted Joker and Bobby, they would never judge her, but anyone else in the club knowing about Esther being alive, in Everett's book, would mean her father failed, in some manner, or that he wasn't perfect. It would be shattering the perfect image Everett had of her father.

-Bobby?

-Yeah?

-Thanks for your help.

He had a nod as the elevator doors opened, Everett leads the way to the front door of her apartment that she unlocked, she heard Mittens cry for food, love, or whatever he was crying for, sometimes he cried just for crying.

As she saw Esther looking outside of the apartment at the city, all calm and quiet, Everett pondered having mercy on her. She was just a sad, pathetic, little old thing. Wheelchair bound at that.

No.

Did Esther ever have mercy on her? Giving her a dad in Jack Gallegos, but forbidding her to get attached to him, or him to her. He'd been her mother's husband for at least seven years, the only dad she had known in her formative years, but for some sick, twisted Esther-reason, Young Everett wasn't allowed to bond with him like a daughter. Unless they were in public. She could hold his hand and call him dad then. If she tried that shit at home, she'd get yelled at.

Or when Everett did her own detective work to find out that her father was alive and well, and was Happy Lowman. Her dad had gotten her the best lawyer in the world, and Esther had kidnapped her and brought her halfway across the States, shacked up with a strange dude that had almost gotten his way with her nine-years old daughter.

Or when Everett was a semi-adjusted twelve years old that finally had a good family life with a mom, dad and siblings, and Esther had sent someone to kidnap her. Plan foiled by a bus driver, but plan nonetheless.

There was the periodical cry for help due to substance abuse or a rough-housing boyfriend. Or just straight up demands for money. Esther Kearns had never had a single bit of mercy for her biological daughter. Why should Everett have any mercy?

Everett headed to the kitchen, she opened a few drawers, considering the options she had handy, Bobby had stayed by the door, he was looking at Esther, his expression said it all. That was the person that had the Lowmans' panties all up in a knot?

-Why would you be stupid enough to come here, Esther?

-Hui-Har-Inn Eu-Loee. Ah-ink-oo Nih meh.

"I read Martin's necrology. I think you need me", both things stop Everett in her track. Her birth mother's labored speech, partially due to a crushed throat, two handful of shattered teeth and partial paralysis of the jaw, and the assumption that Everett ever needed her, or ever would for that matter. The drawer she had opened loudly was closed very quietly, Everett couldn't even help it, she stood her full height, disdain, anger and scornfulness reading all over her face.

-That I'd need you? What made you think. That. I would ever. Need. You?

Fear crossed Esther's eyes as Everett slowly stalked her way, in that same manner Happy did, she didn't even know she was doing it, or looking like an animal about to pounce her prey, it was the same fear Everett used to read in Esther's eyes each time she would ask for Happy, for her real dad, while they were on the run from him. Baby Lowman had taken after her daddy in a lot of aspects.

Now her idea had been originally, to find something nice and maybe slightly unusual to strangle Esther with. Perhaps, the string of an apron, or a string cheese-cutter, maybe even the bag from a loaf of bread, given they were solid enough. Paraphrase beforehand, maybe a good old Sailor-like rant dedicated to all of Esther's faults and lacks as a mother.

But that gleam of fear made her want blood, the old fashioned way. The Lowman way.

Everett pounced, hands ahead ready to clasp, they tumbled over the wheelchair and fell hardly onto the floor, the chair clanged and clanked as it fell sideways, and Everett ended up kneeling on top of her birth mother, slowly suffocating the life out of her, determination read all over her face. This gaping hole would never bother them, ever again. She would make sure of it. And her grip was such that she could feel the brittle bones cracking and breaking under her grip, Esther's eyes were widened with fear, she was trying to cough and grip at Everett's hands, but she had no leeway. And she was starting to choke on her own blood. She managed a cough, blood flew out of her mouth and onto Everett's face, but she was busy having a maniacal expression, Bobby had seen that expression plenty of times before, working alongside Happy.

It only lasted two minutes and a half, top, but it felt like an hour, that eye contact between Everett and Esther as the latter was dying. Understood that she was dying at the hands of her daughter. That it was for real this time, and she wouldn't have some shit-luck to be found and rescued. Esther's blue eyes went empty, finally, she stopped gurgling on her own blood. Bobby's hand on Everett's shoulder made her snap back to reality, she possibly could have spent a few more hours in this position, lost in thought of how she used to idolize this piece of trash.

-You're done, Everett. She's gone, now.

She wiped her cheek, smearing the blood before standing up, she looked around herself before looking back at Bobby.

-Can.

She choked on her own saliva, her voice felt like she had screamed for the past two hours or so. And in all honesty, she had mixed feelings. She was incredibly glad to have finally done it, having closed the loop, so to speak, or finished what her father had started. But she felt sadness as well. Even if she didn't understand why. She had to cough a few times to find her own voice again.

-Can you get rid of the wheelchair?

-What about her?

-I'll take care of it.

Not even her. It. It was a non-entity, now. Bob had a nod, he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and had a fatherly gesture as he wiped her cheek, shoved the piece of fabric back in his pocket before taking the wheelchair, he lifted it over Esther's body to bring it outside, closing the door behind himself. Everett glanced at the clock, it was already eleven, she had no time to waste. At least, Esther was short in stature and pretty skinny from her drug use.

She still sat down for a moment, before getting to work, to figure out how she could dispose of it. She had to have a plan before she started hacking at a corpse.

Brilliant idea. The boat tour. If she captained the bad guy's boat, they would be at sea until very near to dark, she could dump the remains at sea, and it would never be traced back at her. Even if it would be suspect to Sailor that her daughter volunteered so eagerly.


	13. F--- it

**Happy weekend! Posting early because camping trip for the whole weekend! Kurt Sutter owns his own stuff and I own mine!**

* * *

Everett couldn't believe how perfectly everything had worked out to avoid suspicion. On everyone. Happy had invented a family trip to California, and told Lawrence that Everett was expected to join, because there was respect to be paid to her big sister Minnie, Maddie's biological half-sister who had been dead for almost twenty years. And Rain had made up an ill family member in Germany, so Joker had been made to ride with him.

In reality, Sailor had taken King and Flo to California to visit her old friends, Happy would tag along with Joker to go to Dudelange and Everett and Rain were going to Italy. Ok, sure, it wasn't exactly ideal that Happy had to drive a rental car and Everett had to ride a loaner, but it didn't even matter. Because the sights of the scenic route they had planned were absolutely breathtaking, they had to stop often to take them in. The lakes, the architecture, the food, Randy. Just going places without being in a rush. A road that should have taken them about a day spanned over two, because they stopped as soon as they started to revel in the sights.

Then again, Rome. They had put four days in Rome before heading back home on a different route, but seeing how beautiful it all was, it may take longer, At least that was the recurring thoughts in Everett's head. Rain was quiet, not that it was out of the ordinary, but she had expected him to marvel at least a little bit. By the time they got to Rome, she was starting to think that he wasn't having fun at all, he didn't even smile, hadn't since about Grosseto. He seemed to be preoccupied. She was the one that checked them into Hotel Italia, booked online for being a cheap family-run, two star hotel with complementary breakfast, it had looked clean and it had been enough for Everett. She had already taken her kutte off, since she was here solely as a tourist, Rain tough would not take his off even if she handed him a billion dollars worth of diamonds and rubies.

On Google, the description boasted a mere 1.5 kilometers away from the Colosseum, and Everett wanted to go and see it at night, walking. Again, he'd been quiet and moody on the walk over, it was really bothering her. And when they reached the Colosseum, he was getting fidgety, Everett thought that maybe he's taken some drugs. She wasn't going to spend the next week like that.

-Yo, Randy.

-Hm?

-Either you pretend to be having a good time, or you fuck off back to France. It's my fucking birthday, stop acting like your dog died.

-Fuck it. Marry me.

Everett's eyes widened as he reached inside of the kutte he refused to take off, from the inside pocket of his kutte, he pulled the ring, a generic, one carat diamond ring, nothing really special to is aside that it was from Randy to Everett. She had a slight moment of panic, could this really be happening now? Did he even ask her dad? Was it really meant to be?

Who was she kidding? She had been dreaming of this moment ever since she had first set eyes on Rain Queen. Scribble their names in notebooks type of crush. Who gave a flying turd if he had asked Happy for her hand in marriage?

-You really want to marry me? Even if I'm an über bitch?

-What? What? You have moments where you're not an über bitch? Was I blinking?

Everett laughed, and pulled him closer to hug him and say yes, she just wanted to hold on to him. He chuckled, too, and asked her how often she'd been engaged, by now? Because he had lost count.

-My fifth.

-Fifth? Shit, talk about a washed up broad.

-Hey, a washed up broad that can commit homicide in cold blood, watch it.

He was finally smiling as he slid the ring on her finger, before taking the kiss she offered. It was really the best birthday gift she could have thought of. Now he could take his kutte off, start smiling again, and they could have a gorgeous time in this beautiful city.

* * *

The loaner was returned, she had taken the backseat of Rain's bike all the way to Paris, where he would wait for Joker's call to meet and go back to Marseilles, while Everett hopped on a flight to Los Angeles to meet her mother. Happy was waiting for her outside of the airport, at the drop-off zone, smoking a cigarette. Rain had other things to do, so he did not stop to chat, he just took a lingering kiss from Everett and offered a wave of the hand to Happy before taking off loudly, and alone.

-Hi dad.

-What the fuck is wrong with you?

Everett paused, slightly marveled at how her father had as easy of a mood switch as she had, a second ago, he was smiling. Now he was all bitchy, like he couldn't stand a single thing. It probably was the drive, he was never much of a driver.

-Well hi to you, too.

-You're up to something.

She paused for a moment, she was really wondering if he was serious or not.

-A plane. A twenty hour flight with a smelly asshole. Mom yelling her head off when she sees us. What the fuck else you want me to be up to?

-Does it look as nice on your finger as it did in the display?

-Maybe. Fuck you. How much does mom know?

-The bitch knows nothing. Are you gonna let me see, or not?

-Not, screw you. You should have told me.

They both laugh as they finally hug, before heading inside to catch their flight, it's the first time in almost twenty years that her father is going back to America. They aren't going anywhere near Charming, not even San Francisco, strictly Los Angeles.

It will always remain hilarious to Everett that her father secretly took his wife's maiden name for his travel papers, since Happy Lowman is wanted in a lot of places. Joseph Vincent Happy Zlotnik was just the weirdest name ever, and none of Happy's kids could keep a straight face when they had to call him that.

At least on the plane, they can sit down, take their boots off and chat, cuddle against her father's shoulder, she can tell him all about the beautiful week she just spent in Italy with her now fiance, even if she will need to rehash it all as soon as she gets off this flight because Sailor will want to know the minute details of their trip. Happy seemed truly happy for her, that she was finally going through the motions for herself and not for what a third party expected of her.

-I would have murdered you both if you would have married Dan.

-Forget Dan. Dan doesn't even exist in my world.

-But he did in...

-Drop it. Asshole.

He giggled like a little girl, mocked choking her before leaving her alone to her own devices. They would be forced to spend enough time together in LA, when Sailor would make them visit.

Everett wasn't even out of the boarding/unboarding area that Sailor had spotted her, she was yelling dramatically, as if she hadn't seen Everett in years. "My daughter! At last, my daughter", Everett had learned over the years to not feel so embarrassed when Sailor upped the drama. And she knew that reminding Sailor that kind of behavior wasn't exactly how a woman her age should act only made her do it twice as hard. So she just hugged her mother, whispered about how she missed her, and pretended like her parents weren't kissing over her shoulder.

-How was Italy, my pumpkin?

-Hm. Was ok.

-Lying bitch.

-Yo, shut the fuck up?

Sailor laughed, whether the two original Lowman clan members wanted it or not, they were tainted by Sailor's dramatics, in their own ways. Almost always appeared to be bickering in one form or another. King participated in the banter on a regular basis as well, tough he kept it clean towards his dad. Right now, the almost seventeen years old was standing aside, phone in hand he was looking for some Wi/Fi signal.

-Yo dipshit. You don't say hi anymore?

-Anymore, fuck off.

They both smiled and hugged, until King eventually ended up in a neck lock on his knees, Sailor found that endearing, Happy however remained a misogynist at heart. "Elbow her in the taint" he encouraged his son, not knowing it didn't hurt that much. "Fuck off, butt out, dad!" Everett screeched before they broke it up, they didn't want security to get involved.

-Bitch, you made me drop my phone.

-Fuck off. Dipshit.

-That's all you got?

Sailor broken them apart to drag Everett out towards the parking, she was already grilling her daughter about her vacation, where they went, what they had seen, where was Randy now?

-Don't know.

-Did you see the leaning tower?

-That's in Pisa, we skimmed by it. We went to Rome. Not that geography is your forte.

Then she realized she didn't want to have that talk in the car. She didn't want her siblings to poke fun at how romantic she could sound, Everett just wanted this moment alone with her mother. They were trailing behind, keeping Sailor quiet as she got yanked away was no easy task, but within a few minutes, Everett managed to have the both of them sitting at a small coffee shop table inside the airport, with coffees in front of them.

-What's this about, pumpkin?

-Randy asked me to marry him.

Everett had expected her mother to scream, make a big deal or even a scene about it, but for a rare moment, she remained in her seat, and relatively quiet. She didn't look disapproving or anything, she just did not have the type of reaction Everett had came to expect from her.

-He's the one, isn't he, Eve?

-I really think so, mom.

-How did he ask?

-In true Sons's fashion. Fuck it. Marry me.

-Are you pregnant?

-Are you out of your fucking mind? Wait. No. Never mind.

They both snorted a laughter, amused by Everett's rhetorical question. The younger woman let her gaze wander around the thick crowd of the airport, all these people going from one place to another, this was so different than France. People looked like they were in such a rush. She then catches her mother's expression, she looks like she's pondering some unspeakable thoughts, or something.

-What?

-Did you elope?

-No. I'd never do that to you, mom.

-So what's the date.

-We're eloping in three years. When he's turning 45, we're getting on a plane to nowhere and getting married wherever we land.

-Oh, that's sweet.

Everett smiled, before moving her chair around the table to cuddle against her mother, they whispered plans about this wedding that would happen, about how nice the vacations were and would continue to be once Sailor got everyone to Disney, they would probably stay like that until either Happy found them and dragged them out, or security would ask them to leave.


	14. Because that's what Sons do

Next to last chapter of this "first season" of my story! The next chapter will be posted on Wednesday, then the "second season" first chapter will be posted on the first (or second) or July. As always, Kurt Sutter owns all SOA likenesses and names, and I only own my original characters. I make no money from this story.

 **Note: This chapter is very brutal**. Tough. Really tough. If you are very sensitive, I suggest maybe you skip it. It's quite important to the story, sort of, but not worth losing sleep over. If you slept just well with all brutality that happened on SOA, you should be just fine.

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Everett sat there, smoking cigarettes after cigarettes, torn with her inner dilemma as she looked at this couple having late night dinner together in the quaint little house she was sitting on.

Her father's golden rules had been pretty basic. If it came to club business, one tried their best to avoid harming women. Sometimes, it just couldn't be avoided, but 98% of the time, her father had obeyed to that rule. So he could live with himself the rest of his time with the Sons. Esther had been one of the only women he'd ever hurt on purpose. But herself had been at stake in that story, so it was different.

The guy was a double life scumbag. He had messed with the club. He had his legit little front, there, kept that obsessive-compulsive clean, no cop or detective or private eye could find a fault to it without having to scratch a lot of layers. But the asshole also did club business. And he had just burned bridges with Lawrence and Jack and ended a professional and courteous relationship without any professionalism to it, and made off with a pretty loot that Law wanted destroyed, no matter the cost. Lawrence would do no jail time over the incriminating proofs inside of this house.

The guy, Everett wasn't paid to think much of him. He was just a guy, and she had no qualms taking him. The woman... She looked like a school teacher. When Everett had arrived, she seemed to be grading papers while making dinner, she'd made the two of them carbonara spaghetti, not that sauce in a jar bullshit, no, carbonara from scratch, it had smelled good all the way across the street where Everett sat. She looked fairly young, maybe thirty, and when the breeze carried her voice, it sounded like a school teacher, Everett could never make out any of her words, but her voice was soft. Sort of like Miss Maltais' voice, the first teacher Everett had when they moved to France. Miss Maltais was such a soft spoken old lady that Everett had strained for eight months to hear what the woman was saying in the classroom.

It's the bastard's smug smiles that made Everett decide to go on with it. The students would sure miss their teacher in the morning, but Everett needed to act before the incriminating things whatever they were left that house. She still wished she could get that woman out of the house, to go run an errand or anything. But this late at night, it was unlikely. At least they had let the dog out, Everett had opened the gate of their fenced yard, and the dog had wandered off. They hadn't realized that yet.

Arson was something she was really good at. Within two minutes, tall flames were rising in three different points of the house, blocking all doors to get out of the house, and one large windows they easily could have escaped from. Everett couldn't stay long at all, it would be a matter of a minute before neighbors were woken up and would phone the fire department, the response time was seven and a half minutes on average. Plenty of time to do the job. Everett had already retreated outside of the yard when a window broke, it was high up, like a bathroom window, and a kid was shoved out, Everett just froze, horrified. Her brown eyes widened as a piece of the roof fell just beside the kid, far enough not to crush him, but too close to not harm him or her, in the dark, Everett couldn't tell. The kid was holding a baby blanket, a binky in his hands as he was trying to get himself up, he had to be no older than three, getting up required getting on all fours. And the blanket caught fire. And the sleeve of the pajama caught fire. And Everett let out an anguished scream of terror, this was going all sorts of wrong, she should have walked away. He'd already been crying when he got tossed out a window, he started screaming in panic the second the flames started licking his short.

-Good Lord, please just first degree burns, please.

She'd forget everything that had gotten her to this point as she rushed the kid, she had probably started walking back when the binky caught fire, by the time the flames were reaching the elbow, she was running full speed, yelling "Stop drop and roll" in English, not that the kid would understand that, she had no recollection if they taught that in France or not. By the time she could shove him to the ground to either cover him with her motorcycle jacket or roll him, his whole pajama was burning, and another piece of roof fell, this time, across his chest, and it was far too heavy for Everett to push it off. The kid had two screams, and it killed Everett, who whimpered "what have I done?" twice before un-holstering her gun. He couldn't be saved. She put him out of his misery before fleeing.

She couldn't see the road, and she wiped out about ten minutes outside of the quiet little town she'd just left. Her leg was pinned, she could easily push her motorcycle up and free it. Instead, she just laid there and cried for a good moment, until a late night motorist stopped to check on her. So she fled again. It reeked of gasoline, fire and guilt, but she didn't care, she had a loaner with no licence plate.

She had no clue where to go. If she went home, she might throw herself down the balcony. If she went in her parents' bed, her mother may say something in the effect of doing the right thing, which she couldn't do, that was arson and triple homicide. And her dad would probably take it to Law. Happy was in no shape to fight that kind of fights anymore. And she didn't want to bother Randy. He was probably sleeping anyways.

There was Joker. But she couldn't bring herself to. It was probably best she just went home, took a bath. Wash the smell off, even if there was nothing she could do about the guilt.

She made a few steps inside of her one and a half bedroom, and sat on the first seat she came across, before starting to cry again. She should have listened to herself, and walk away when she saw that teacher-looking woman. And now she had just murdered that baby.

-Lord, oh Lord, why? Why?

-Bug, what happened?

Seeing Randy there in nothing but his boxers made it even worst. She came here to be alone and there was was in all his glory and care for her, hugging her and trying to pry from her what had happened. She wailed and weeped through the recollection, most likely making herself hard to understand, but Randy just kept quiet, he listened through it, rubbing the short hair peering through the bottom of her motorcycle helmet.

-Shit bug, that's terrible. I'm sorry.

Didn't make her feel any better, but Randy would never try to downplay any of it. It happened, it was out there, now they just had to deal with it. But it wasn't the type of incident you could bounce back from after a night of sleep and seeing the sunshine. In the sunshine's light, she felt even more miserable of what she had done.

Randy had managed to drag her out of bed by ten o'clock, said nothing about how much of a mess she looked like, the television was open on a random channel. Neither of them cared to listen to its white noises as Randy tried to get her in a state of at least getting their stories straight should the police show up. He would give her an alibi for sure, even if it meant the whole club knowing that they'd been having sex together for over a year. He'd tamper the paperwork and video surveillance of his gym if he had to. Make it look like he was there with her half of the night. She didn't want him to, but it still meant a lot that he would if she had asked him to.

The day was terrible, the night sleepless, but Randy had to go to work, so Herman Losique was called over to stay with her for the day. And Herman came over with the ugly truth of what she had done, it was all over the papers. _She_ was indeed a school teacher, their _twin_ children were two and a half years old, and he wasn't an accountant. He was the Son's former lawyer. So anyone with a kutte roaming the streets today would be picked up. Herman had left the house in his Volvo and nothing but a plain band shirt. Rain had left on his motorcycle with his kutte on. He probably wouldn't make it to the gym. And the newspaper had a quote from Lawrence, calling it an unfortunate tragedy, but denying any involvement from the Sons. Everett wasn't a son yet, still. The whole afternoon was just one big anxiety crisis of being thrown under the bus as the culprit by the club she cherished more than she did her own family. Herman had a lot of work trying to keep her inside and trying to calm her down.

It helped little to none at all to have her mother come upstairs around eight at night, absolutely livid that the cops had barged their apartment downstairs and taken Happy, and they were looking for her. She had came to ask "did you do it?" but her tears and panic attacks spoke for themselves. Yes, yes she had done it. And it would be a matter of a few hours before they got their hands on Everett's address, which was the same as her father, apartment number aside.

-You need to leave, pumpkin. My keys are in the truck, just get out of here. Lay low until it passes. Take him with you. I'll take care of daddy and Randy, ok? Don't speed, don't drive erratically, just go to gammy's house, ok?

Grandma Marjorie's old house, near Arcachon, with view and a beach giving on the Bay of Biscay, it had been sitting empty or so since Marjorie had died of old age ten odd years before. They sometimes went there during vacation. Sailor hugged her tightly after packing her a bag, brought her downstairs and hugged her further as Herman went around to go and get the SUV. He had just came back in the lobby when the cops stormed the lobby to arrest her and Herman both, he was known from the authorities. There was a lot of yelling, someone grabbed Everett roughly, it made Sailor scream bloody murder, and stopped everyone involved in the chaotic situation.

-She's having a miscarriage! Can't you see her face? Isn't she suffering enough? Let her go to the hospital! I swear if you stuff her in the back of your car without giving her medical attention, I'm suing everyone's asses in here for their pension!

Meaning, Everett would have to have an obligatory stop at the hospital, but Jack's wife Lara worked there. She would help Everett slip out the back to make her escape. Everett was still very grateful for her mother's quick thinking and sublime improvisational skills. Sailor would motherly rub Everett's back to the truck, saying stuff like "maybe the doctors can save him, you know?" and "technology is a lot more advanced then when you were born, pumpkin."She still whispered as she put Everett in the back seat of the SUV "You make a break for it first chance you get, Eve.", her mom would never tell that Everett was heading for Arcachon.

-I love you, mom.

Sailor smiled, rubbed Everett's cheek before closing the SUV's door. It wasn't Herman behind the wheel, it was a cop, that put another obstacle in her way, as he asked what hospital she had called ahead to go to. Shit.


	15. Scapegoats

**Last chapter of this series! Will be back in July for the second part! The original SOA characters and likenesses belong to Kurt Sutter, and the characters I have created belong to me! Please, leave me a little review? It would be very nice of you.**

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What had made her come back was word that Law had found a scapegoat for the arson and murder of the lawyer and his family.

On her way to the hospital, she had managed to feign being sick, and when the cop pulled over her mother's SUV, she had sprinted out of there like a bat out of hell. She had managed to slip out of the city before they could decide to cut off her retreat, and she had spent ten days in Arcachon, anxiously awaiting word. From anyone. She would probably do some soft time for evading police custody, ninety days at most, her dad had said. Then Joker had called. Someone was going to step up and surrender for it. He didn't know who. So he picked her up in Bordeaux, hugged her for a long time and brought her back to Marseilles.

Joker smelled of cigarettes and soap, curious mix, but she took it in, riding back. She would have to do the same with Randy and her dad, if she was to go to jail for three months. She had a pang in her stomach, the road was a blur; she wasn't scared of prison, she was just scared of being away from her family. Better three months than thirty years for arson and murder.

Joker dropped her off at Rain's apartment building. As if he knew. She had just spent ten excruciating days alone, Everett wasn't built and wired to be alone. She had been alone and lonely in her childhood, even with a mother and fake father and fake step brother and aunt Kary. Then from her tenth birthday up to now, she'd been raised by the wolves. She needed human contact.

-Thanks, Phil.

-Ey, ey, don't start the sentimental bullshit with me, kiddo. Just get up there and get dicked.

Everett chuckled, shoved him playfully before heading upstairs, to Rain's penthouse. At this hour, he would be at the gym, still, it was mid-afternoon. In the elevator, her phone rang, it was her mother, pretty much ordering her home as soon as she would be done with Rain. She had slaved all afternoon on Everett's favorites, and she would be damned if she had to sit alone with Happy and eat it all. Damned, you hear me, Everett? Damned!

-What's wrong with eating alone with dad?

"Oh, really? How much time do you have? In what order do you want me to start? Order of priority, or alphabetical?"

-Keep it warm, mom. I'm gonna wait for Randy, we'll probably have late lunch, I'll be there around eight. Maybe nine. With enough luck, Florence will be back, King, too, and we can all eat together. And pressing buttons on the phone to order Chinese isn't considered slaving all afternoon.

"Yeah? Well... Y-y-y... You're adopted."

The click of the phone hanging up, Everett laughs. The classic adopted card. It was usually Happy that played it on Maddie. Not the other way around. The elevator's doors opened, there was three guys on the other side, two Spaniards and an Italian waiting for the elevator, no colors, nothing suspicious about them, really, there were three penthouses at the top of this building. And honestly, they looked like furniture movers. They smiled at one another, as Everett stepped out of the elevator, one of the Spaniards, the tallest one, cat called her as the elevator doors closed, it just made her roll her eyes as she pushed her key in Randy's front door.

She could hear him, he was talking on the phone, possibly in German, a language she had very little notions of, she could count to three, and it may have been Dutch she was counting in, she was never sure. She wasn't expecting him to be here already, she had hoped she could try her hand at cooking something half decent, and surprise him when he got back. German sounded like such an angry language, Randy sounded like he was arguing. But when he hung up, he had a small smile for her.

-Well, I pissed off my entire family.

-How?

-Hm...

He shrugs, pulls Everett close and into a lingering kiss, it makes her giggle uncontrollably, he's pushing her towards the bed. After ten days, it's going to be the best lay ever.

Unless Randy had something completely different in mind. He fed her big ego with a few touches and kisses, but there's something else going on, and he doesn't seem to want to talk about it, but looks hopeful maybe that she would open up the conversation.

-Ok, Randy, what?

-What?

-Oh don't bullshit me! By this time you're usually forty inches deep into me and pulling my hair and spanking my ass. Among other weird things we do when we fuck. What? You're clothes are still on. Let alone mines.

He has another of his pale smiles, topples her with a kiss, but still isn't getting anything on, she knows it's something big. Something huge. Something he doesn't want to tell her because he knows she's going to oppose with everything she has.

-What did you do, Randy?

He tries to quiet her with a kiss, only to get struck on the shoulder, he had better answer her quickly, before she decided to beat the shit out of him.

-Fuck off. What did you do?

-If I surrender, I get half the time.

-Surrender for what?

-Arson. And murder.

-Are you out of your fucking mind? No! No way! Not fucking happening.

-I have twenty-four hours. I just told my mother.

Everett feels the crazy crawling up from where it usually quietly sits and waits for it's time. She will fight him with everything she has, should she shackle him in the basement of her father's apartment building. They have plans! For in three years. Travels and wedding and all that bullshit. Everett becoming a Son. On about a year after that, coming forward for being together. Moving in and all that bullshit. How does he expect to do all that crap if he's in jail?

He got up and tried to walk away, prompting Everett to follow him. She could hear herself starting to nag him, as much as she wished she wouldn't, she just couldn't help it. Next would be threats. Any threats she could think of to hopefully change him mind. Then crazy would probably take over, and she'd knock him over the head with something heavy, drag him to the basement and lock him up.

Perhaps they could leave? It worked for her parents. They had been gone from California for eighteen years, he'd even went back once, and they had gotten on just fine. They could leave. Go in Germany. She could learn German. Sailor had learned French, why could Everett not learn German? Or they could go to Charming? Yes, yes, Charming was a brilliant idea. Her father still had his Russian contacts, they could get smuggled back. She could...

She wished she could just shut up for a minute, stop following Rain around the apartment. He was trying to defuse the situation by just walking away for a moment, and she really wasn't helping.

After about the fifth time going around the penthouse, he turns around and bellows for her to fuck off. She freezes, he's never spoken to her that way before, nor the tone or the words, it's really impressive. And she knows she had better back off, right now. Walk away and leave him alone. So she does, she doesn't even take anything, her shoes, bag, jacket, anything, she just walks out of the apartment, takes the elevator downstairs, and hidden in a corner of the parking lot, near storage, she smokes and cries.

Everett understands, she really does. Rain doesn't want to see her in jail for twenty, thirty years. She had managed for this long to keep her police file down to misdemeanors. Domestics and things. She had committed plenty of felonies but never had gotten caught. Rain had a police file ticker than his arms. And he would probably do a lot better than her in prison. He's fare really well. Structured environments were his thing. Not hers.

Still. Fifteen years. He knew he could do it, but she wouldn't. Not alone, not without him. It was like asking her to stop smoking, or setting shit on fire. Or fucking.

But going to jail over this shit meant she wouldn't become a Son. Randy was giving up his own vote for her. He'd just do the Son's dirty work from inside the Baumettes correctional facility. Even if it meant eventually never getting out of there alive. She would murder anyone who came up with that stupid ass plan.

What if she surrendered first? She had to decide, right now, what was more important. What was more important to her? Becoming a Sons, or having Randy.

If she went to jail, and was really behaved, she could get out in twenty years. She could still become a Son? Forty-seven seemed like a good age to become a Son.

Getting back up to Randy's penthouse, she was thinking of everything she would miss, in the next twenty years. her own wedding, Maddie's. Flo's and King's. Her parents' twenty-fifth anniversary. Her siblings' graduations. Rain's fiftieth birthday. Possibly his sixtieth, too. Her mom's retirement. Nephews and nieces. Kids. Not that she wanted them, but she'd still been curious as to what kids looking like her and Randy would look like.

And her dad. Her dad was sixty-six years old. He may very well be dead in twenty years. Eighty-six was old.

She was crying, by the time she reached the door, but she was determined. She would take her keys, go kiss her parents and her family, and she would surrender before Randy could. She would have to be quick with these goodbyes to her family, the asshole may very well race her there.

-Randy?

No answer, maybe it was just as well. Just as well that he'd gone for a walk, or looking for her. She could just leave him a note, grab her keys and leave. Oh, and she had to bring Mittens downstairs to her parents' when she got home. Sailor would take care of him. God, her life wasn't even stable enough to take care of a cat from birth to death...

-Oh my god, Randy!

He was laying on the living room floor, holding his stomach, there was blood, maybe not everywhere, but on a lot of the furniture. And on his face and hands. She dropped to her knees near him, panicked, he had been shot, point blank. She ripped her shirt off, balled it up on his wound and reached with her foot to knock the landline phone to the floor, she dialed 911, and just started screaming the address, and hurry, he's bleeding out.

-Hold on, baby. Please, hold on, ok? I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, I didn't want to argue with you now!

He garbled something, his eyes were rolling, she wished she knew how long he'd been alone up here, bleeding out, he was so pale. She tried to get him to quiet, he closed his eyes for a moment, it made her very scared. She screamed his name, and he snapped his eyes open, grabbed her arm, and spoke with a lot of difficulty.

-Don't... trust...

Whoever he named, was so garbled and lost in a fit of cough and blood that she didn't made it out. Could have been anyone or anything. Don't trust Vince from Shamwow. Don't trust the mailman. Don't trust your accountant. He closed his eyes again, he was trying to breathe. All she could do aside from keep the pressure is repeat how sorry she was.

-Bug... Love. I love. you.

-Don't say that. The ambulance is coming. They're gonna fix you. They're gonna fix you, baby.

He had a smile, a small nod. They would fix him up. As long as she kept the pressure. As long as she kept the pressure.


	16. Season 2: Manslaughter

**Welcome back! I don't know why I kept on thinking that June had 31 days, so I actually had an extra day to write this chapter... Silly me! That's ok. As usual, the original SOA characters and likenesses belong to Kurt Sutter, and the characters I created, Everett, Sailor, Maddie etc, all belong to myself! Anything related to the movie Let's go to Prison I would guess belongs to Jim Hogshire, but I may be wrong.**

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Manslaughter.

Normally, manslaughter got you between four and fifteen years. Get yourself a good lawyer, you can maybe walk with three years firm.

The only evidence they had and pushed towards the jury had been the phone call to the emergency services. The ones where they could hear her clear as day apologizing to Randy as he laid dying. They had decided, whom, she didn't know or care, that it meant guilt.

Everett had been feeling guilt. Everyday since then. There hadn't been a single day where she hadn't knelt beside that bunk bed, hands joined in a prayer, to be forgiven for being so stupid. For being so nagging. For walking away like he had demanded. If she hadn't, they would have been two, and Rain would have lived. Or they both would have died, guns blazing against whoever had done this to Rain.

Rain was going to surrender for arson and homicide. So he was less than nothing in everyone's eyes. So much less than nothing that Everett had been sentenced to jail because they couldn't possibly give her a medal for offing a Son. One year. One year was her sentence. She was practically a hero in the eyes of law enforcement.

Lawrence came to see her often. Truth had come out about her and Rain when she got hauled away from his dying body, kicking and screaming to stay with him. She hadn't wanted Randy to die alone, surrounded by stranger. Downstairs, Law was coming up, alerted that something was going on with one of his members. She had screamed for him, begged him to hurry upstairs, that Rain couldn't be alone with them. He'd seen her crying, shoe-less, disheveled and screaming for Randy, putting two and two together hadn't been so hard, she had some of her things all over that apartment. Toothbrush, hairbrush, clothes, tools, motorcycle gear. Photos, in the bedroom. He still had known she never could have done that. Either that, or her parents had convinced Lawrence. Told him about the wedding plans and shit. Because she knew it couldn't have been Bob Seger or Joker. Even in tragedy, they would remain tombs.

They both came and visited her often. It was hard, being in jail. She'd spent plenty of time caged up at the commissariat pending investigation, or in the drunk tank, but she had never been jailed up this way. She saw her father, and Herman Losique, but she refused to see her mother or Maddie. She never wanted them to see her like this. It was hard enough putting a brave face on for the guys. Losique had told her that he would sponsor her in place of Rain. Losique was the only one who could sit there quietly, and not try to make her talk. He'd just slip her cigarettes, once in a while, when the guards weren't looking, he'd reach across the table and rub her knuckles, and try to smile, as if to say "I got your back".

Don't trust, Rain had said. Don't trust, _someone_. That had been obsessing her. Whom? Whom shouldn't she trust? She knew it couldn't possibly have been her friends. Rain sang Joker's, Losique's, Bob Seger's and Lawrence's praises really often. He trusted them more than he trusted his own parents. Don't trust meant it had been an inside job. Someone she knew, someone she normally would trust.

Some days, in her loneliness and paranoia, she thought the only ones she could truly trust were Losique and Joker. All other could be suspect. And the motives obsessed her. Why? What threat could Rain Queen possibly to anyone? He was physically imposing, yes, but the guys wasn't particularly brainy, he just liked to follow order and keep his routine. He was just brawny. And she knew it couldn't possibly be the result of a Mayhem vote. Losique would have never voted "yea" for that. Not in a million years. He and Rain were practically brothers. They had pent a lot of years in foster care together, and had managed to be adopted together, in the same extended family.

And Joker... Joker had sponsored Randy, when Randy first wanted to become a son. He'd been the only guy Joker had ever sponsored. Despite only being fourteen years apart in age, Joker had always been some sort of father figure to Rain. He wouldn't have went with the mayhem vote either.

All this thinking had to stop. She knew it, but had no real control over it. She was a few notches away from the string billboard of possible suspects and motives. Sometimes, she would just scream at the top of her lung. That there was no motives to kill Randy Coin. Absolutely none. But that she had to know who his killer was. Because if it had been someone she had never known or met, he wouldn't have spoken of trust as he laid there dying. He would have said some shit like "hold on, Bug", or "I love you, you know that?"

He said.

Don't trust.

Manslaughter. One year.

Was Everett Lowman finally going insane? She had always taken pride in keeping her little crazy side, gift of her birth mother, under control. Keep the paranoia and manipulation and scheming under a firm grip. It was OK to do bad things to people, but if had to be clean and direct. No toying with peoples' heads. No manipulating them into what she wanted. No scheming her way around. She didn't want to be like Esther. Never had wanted to be like Esther. Everett wanted to be like Sailor and Happy.

The hardest thing in jail was the lack of physical contact. She easily could have gotten herself a girlfriend inside, to trump it, for a good fuck, but she didn't want that. She missed her mom's and Rain's hugs. And her dad's. Her dad gave, without the shadow of a single doubt, the best hugs ever. The kind of hugs that made you feel like you mattered to him. That he'd never let you go, he'd always have your back. They were a million time better than Sailor's mom hugs in optimal conditions. And those were really good hugs. She missed being able to just sneak into the elevator, and go downstairs to go sleep between her parents, even if she was on the wrong side of twenty-five.

She missed her cat. Her cat that could ignore her for days, only to want to cuddle her when she sat on the computer chair, doing some accounting for people. Mittens would come over and scratch her thighs to shreds until she took him on her lap. He'd sit there and purred and rolled around to finally leave after leaving a ton of orange and white hairs on Everett's shirt.

She missed real food. Everything served here came from giant plastic bags. It was saggy, tasteless, texture-less, and had really strange colors. "Meat, not meat?" she'd be asked. Before, before she'd ever went to jail, it made her laugh, when she'd listen to "Let's Go To Prison", and the kitchen guy would ask Will Arnett "meat, not meat?" and he'd asked what the difference was. Now, it made her want to cry. It hadn't been a scene for comedic relief. It had been the sad truth. Meat, not meat? She could shank a bitch for a single plate of something her mother had "slaved over all afternoon cooking"...

She'd shank a bitch for an octopus hug from Maddie. For a moment of smoking alone with her dad, watching chicks walks in front of their apartment building. To have Randy back. A black, meaningful stare from King. Or a "ew! Ew, ew I-don't-wanna-hug-you-in-front-of-my-friends-because-you-smell-gross-and-this-is-embarrassing" moment with Flo.

She was crying all the time. It was pathetic, but there was no one to tell her to stop. She just didn't know what she would do, when she would get out of jail, in four more weeks. Her apartment would still be full of Randy's presence. The clothes and tools and motorcycle gear he'd left there. The projects and shit. She had waited so long for Randy. She'd spent so long sighing and lusting after him, there could be no one else to ever replace him.

The only thing she knew she could count on was that her parents would have kept her apartment, or at least some place to stay. Be it a smaller place or her old bedroom back. Losique would sponsor her to become a son, when Lawrence would accept her as a prospect. And her parents would be there. And the only regret she had regarding her year in jail was that there was nothing she could have done to prove her loyalty to the Sons from in here. Sons of Anarchy had no beef with anyone in the women's unit of the prison, and she had no access to the three men's units. Not even when she was on laundry duty. So she was pretty much starting back from scratch.

Four weeks left, in this big, overcrowded, smelly oven. One of the things that kept her going were letters from her little brother King. He was a minor, could not visit her, but he would write her often, telling her he was taking care of her cat, washing her motorcycle or watering her plants. He was such a good kid.

Prison was the absolute worst. No wonder Rain wanted to go in her place. She could absolutely not, was not cut out at all for twenty years in this place. She never backed down from a fight, never let anyone step on her toes, but she couldn't feel like a caged animal much longer, or she would murder everyone in here. She would set the dorms on fire in the middle of the night, and watch the bitch burn. Did they still have death row and lethal injections, in France? Maybe she could transfer to the US? Would that be possible?

No, probably not. She'd never committed a single crime, there. She beat up some people, but she'd never committed any crimes that could get her arrested, and she had became a naturalized citizen of France over a decade ago.

These last four weeks would feel like forever. Now she knew what her dad meant, whenever he spoke of the nine years he'd done in for the Sons, when she was just a little kid. The things you miss. The worry of everyone. The responsibilities that you're supposed to be having, that you can't take care of, and it obsesses you. But her dad had been locked up with almost all of his charter, his friends and brothers. She was alone. She'd lost her apprenticeship at the tattoo parlor for sure.

She was anxious about her release. It would mean having to face everyone and everything. She should have stayed upstairs with Rain. She never should have nagged him like that, like a fucking teen girl. He never would have yelled for her to fuck off. If she had a soul, she would sell it to the Devil for just a few hours of Rain.

Fucking manslaughter.


	17. Strange freedom

**I was trying to figure out a way to make his chapter longer, but I really think it's just right the way it is. I hope you enjoy it. Leave me a lil' review, it would really make me happy. And happy Fourth of July to all my American friends, tomorrow! Enjoy the fireworks, and don't party too hard!**

* * *

Released had been nothing like she had imagined. She wasn't even discharged to freedom. Everett was being discharged to a halfway house, where she would need to live for at least four months, conditions of her probation. She had to be in every night at five, and she could not have contact with anyone being a felon. Not even her dad. The one person she needed the most. She needed to find herself a real, legit job, and she would need to see her PO every three days for drug testing. That was the most ridiculous condition, according to Maddie. Everett didn't even smoke weed, let alone pop pills, she could do all that crap stone cold sober. Just like their dad.

Everett couldn't love Maddie more than when her little sister showed up at the halfway house and took control of the situation. She had probably been sent by their mother, but Everett didn't care. She could hug her sister, just stand there and hug her for as long as she needed. "You look terrible!" had been Maddie's chirpy comment. There wasn't anything she should have decoded about that, so she guessed she just did look pretty shitty. Still, her sister's ever-so-raw honesty was enough, just enough just at the right moment to put a smile on Everett's face.

-I needed that.

-I know.

The halfway house was visited, and Everett saw herself in a real mirror. She had lost about twenty pounds. Mostly muscle mass, she wasn't big to start with, but with that lost weight, she had her father's angular face. These creases he always had on his cheeks, she now had as well. She did look like complete and utter shit. Especially in the clothes she had been released in, a beige, over-sized and scratchy sweater and some ill fitting jeans, and the white soles shoes that had been hers for the past year. Her clothes had been kept as evidence.

Her sister's presence had been a blessing. Maddie wasn't allowed in the rooming portion of the house, but she had some clothes for Everett, real clothes, her own clothes. One of her favorite pairs of skinnies, her black socks, riding boots, a band t-shirt, no bra or panties, but her leather jacket. The one Randy had bought her for her birthday. To have real clothes was a first step in the right direction. And when she met her sister in the common area, Maddie was warming up a Tupperware in the microwave. It smelled like Angelo Pizzeria's pizza. The microwave beeped, Maddie removed the container, and handed it to her big sister.

-Mom slaved two days over that one.

Just that would have been enough to make Everett start to cry again, but she held on to her tears the best she could, hugging her sister again. Her own clothes. Hugs. Food her mom had slaved over. It almost made up for not being able to have access to her father. Almost, but not quite.

-How's dad?

-Dappy? He's good, mom finally talked him into cortisone for his elbows. Screamo-Dad has been helping him trying to find a way around the no seeing felons thing.

-I thought Screamo-dad was in Germany. Netherlands? Russia?

-Hm, he's been in England for the past few months, right now he's crashing at mom's, until his band decides if they write more or tour further. Dappy is pretty glad to have some male company, with King gone for college.

-Hm.

-Momma fired her accountant.

-Why?

-To give you a job, stupid. It's a requirement for you staying out of jail. And le mom knows you better than you know yourself. Nine to five ain't your thing. Eat, before it gets too cold.

But eating, even if it did smell delicious, was the last thing on Everett's mind. Everything she wanted the most, she could not have. Maddie sat down, Everett followed the movement, almost brainwashed by prison routine, she had a heavy sigh, detailing the room around her. It was so bland and impersonal. Even more than prison had been. At least prison was never quiet like this. Not even at night. Her boots felt so strange at her feet. She pulled her leather jacket closed and zipped it, looking at her now twenty-two years old sister. Madison was wearing a skinny-mini with some knee high boots and a jean jacket, no makeup and her long auburn hair was curling down to her waist. She was holding and drinking a coffee from McDonalds, she had her nails done recently. She was chatting about her last boyfriend, not that Everett was really listening.

-... and he was totally trying to do that. To LE ME! Can you imagine that? I just broke his nose, he's never gonna try to do that to any girls, ever again.

-Who buried Randy, Mad?

A pause. Maddie had opened her mouth to say something, had closed it back right away, taken a short breath to compose herself. All this talk about fashion and boyfriends and nose breaking had been to keep Everett distracted from the grim reality, at least that's how it appeared to be. But even six years younger, Madison knew she couldn't escaped the imminent conversation. She licked her pink lips, leaned forward to put her coffee on the table.

-Germany. I'm sorry. Mom and dad and Law tried their best, but Randy's mom would not have it. She refused to tell anyone, family or club-wise, even in what city they lived, so we could go and pay him homage. She said you killed him. Seventy different people telling her you never would or could have, she still is convinced you did it. I mean! It was a sloppy investigation, but there was zero evidence against you! All they had was that stupid phone call.

-Stop talking.

Better have asked Maddie for the moon, it would have been easier, but the younger woman managed, she looked about to cry. Not something Everett wanted, but her head was spinning and buzzing and doing everything it could do to hurt her. An intense headache had been building up, these past few days, apprehension of this false freedom she was just given. At least their mom was trying to facilitate for Everett as much as she could, going as far as taking her accountant out of the picture. She'd have an address for her in four months, that was a certainty.

-It's gonna be the longest four months of my life, Mad.

-I know. That's ok. I'm an adult now, Evie. Le adult.

-I'll slap you.

-I'll fight your fights for you until you're back on your feet, kay?

-No. Don't do that to mom. She's already losing me to the life, and no doubt she'll lose King to it, too. Don't do that to her, it would kill her. My fights can go "unfought" for another four months. Let Joker fight for my name until then, ok?

-Ok. I missed you. And I hate you for not allowing me to visit you.

-I was a mess.

-Still are.

-Where do you want me to punch you first?

Maddie had a short giggle, as someone came into the room, asked aloud which of them was Everett Lowman. Everett raised her hand, and the woman asked dryly for Madison to leave, they put no fight for it, Maddie got up and hugged her sister tightly, whispered promises to stop by the Pirate headquarters the next day to do something about her hair and her nails. It hadn't been said to be vain, it was just opening a door for some time together, to do something that would make Everett feel a bit better.

-I love you, k?

-I love you, too. I'll tell mom you're ok.

-Don't. I'll tell her myself tomorrow when I go to work.

-Ok.

-And tell the dads I love them.

-I sure will. Flo wanted to know if she could visit you here.

-Hell no. I'll see her soon.

Maddie left with a nod after pushing her coffee towards her sister, the woman was her PO, who came to verify that she would be getting a job, and her conditions and whatnot. Everett was getting pangs in her stomach of talking to her. She had needed more time with her sister's oh-so-familiar face. She had needed more time to tame this strange freedom. Maybe go hide and cry a bit about it, before harnessing her pain and suffering. She wasn't over prison. She wasn't over the bullshit. And she certainly wasn't over Randy. At this particular point, she didn't think she ever could be.

-You're really not going to allow me to see my father, are you?

-Has he ever been convicted of a felony?

-Twice.

-Nope.

-Really, my dad? He's sixty-eight years old and on his last leg, and he's put that life behind him years ago.

Two years ago. For his daughter. For his Stars.

But no. Nothing could make the woman bend and give her permission to even call her father on the phone to tell him she was OK. And if he was a regular around her mother's offices, Everett would have to find herself a different job. That could have normally made Everett smile, she did not think her dad even knew if Sailor had offices for her business, let alone would he know where they were.

That was Everett's life, now. Alone, and cut off from everything that always meant something to her.


	18. Home

Hope everyone is well! No disclaimer tonight, ya'll know the drill! Kurt sutter owns Kurt Sutter.

* * *

The heat was unbearable, the whole city seemed ghostly, dead, as everyone was taking shelter indoors. Everett could feel herself cooking, as she rode across town on her motorcycle for the first time in forever, and she had a genuine worry that if she stopped for longer than a stop sign her tires might melt. That wouldn't have stopped her from going across town. Five months of being painfully good, of reporting whenever she had to, of living in this shit-hole, of non-contact with her whole family, except for Maddie that came every morning with a coffee and a pastry. Turning down her mom's job offer had been the hardest thing, but it would have been too easy to succumb the temptation of seeing her dad, thus breaking her conditions, and going back to jail was the last thing she had wanted.

So she had dressed down, and played the good girl for the past five months. Took her old accounting job back, reported to the PO every second day, was home at five thirty every night without fault, she had the will to do it.

And now this morning, her conditions had been removed. She was allowed to move out of the halfway house, and live on her own, as long as she met her PO twice a week still, to pee in the cup. And she had to attend the NA meetings. That was some bullshit, but some bullshit she could easily deal with. Additionally, she could not live with a felon. That was OK. Her mother would have a place for her.

Oh, the heat. It was hotter than hell.

She was swimming in her pits juices when she parked her bike in front of the apartment building, she could feel it dripping along her spine as she removed her helmet and hung it on the handlebar. In the lobby, it was sunny, but oh, providential HVAC providing cool air conditioning. Everett paused a long moment as the door closed behind her, she let out a long breathe before crossing to go into her parents' aquarium-apartment. Her mom was home, at this hour, her truck was outside.

-Ma? Dad?

It was quiet. They couldn't have been having sex, it was just way too hot. Even over the window air conditioner, she would have heard them. The door to their bedroom was open.

-Mommy! I'm hungry as fuck! Feed me! Feed ME!

Nope. Nothing or no one. On the back of their apartment door, a note from her mom. She had just freed apartment 74A for her, and Mittens was waiting for her. Urh. 74A, that was such a long elevator ride. So much crappy muzak.

The door was unlocked, of course, she didn't have the key. It wasn't as cool up here as it was down there, heat rises, she hoped her dad had put her AC in the window and cranked that sucker full blast, Mittens would be in a bitch as fuck mood, if he was hot. That cat was so fucking temperamental that it was imposs...

"SURPRISE!"

Everett literally jumped backwards towards the door, both fists raised in a defensive manner, surprise indeed reading all over her face. Hanging on the wall above the living room's arch door, a banner that was hand made and read "Welcome home, Lowman", and in the big living room, everyone. Her dad, her mom, her sisters and her brother, her friends from the club, the very few friends she had outside of the club. Her heart swelled at the sight of them all. She had believed for a while there that she would never see any of them, ever again.

Juicy, Jack and Hopie were the three closest to her physically, but her father was right there, within arm's reach, he just grabbed a handful of her light jacket and pulled her into a hug, and it was the best hug she had received in a year. Eyes closed and her nose smashed against her father's clavicle, hello, nosebleed, she heard her mother have a sigh of endearment. She could feel her own tears rolling down her cheeks, her dad. Her dad, it was so good. She was too choked up to talk, but it didn't even matter. After a few minutes of them just not moving, Sailor got the party underway around them, because they may very well have stayed like that all evening, and it would have been very awkward for everyone to just stand there and watch.

After what felt like ninety minutes, her dad had a slight chuckle, whispering in her ear.

-Are you good, or do you need more?

-Just ten minutes more.

-Ok. Twenty minutes more.

She could just smile, he was needing this, too. It must have been such a torture for him not to seek her out, these past five months.

Her face is sticky with blood, when she pulls out, her father will need to go and change his shirt, because she really bled a lot. She would want to hug and talk to more people, but she needs to remove her jacket and clean her face, and possibly change her shirt, too. But the first on her list was her mother.

-Oh, let me look at you, light of my life. Look how gorgeous you are! Oh, could you look like your bastard father any more?

-Light of my life, isn't that Maddie? I'm pumpkin.

-Oh, shut your face. You are ruining the fucking moment.

-I love you, mom. I missed you.

-Go see your friends. And you better come and sleep in my bed, or I'll sic your father on you.

-I'll be there.

Still, she could not help but look around her, looking for Randy. He would have been the only reason she would have missed that, sleeping in her mom's bed. Her eyes met Joker's, who went out of his way to come and grab Everett in his arms, after dumping his beer for Alexandro Montel to hold.

-Aye aye aye, my love. I have missed you something stupid.

-I've missed you, too, old man.

-You want to hear something good?

-Please. Anything as long as it's good.

-I've never been convicted of a felony. Not here or in Canada.

-Really?

-Say hello you your new bunk mate.

There was nothing, anyone in the world could have told her right now that could have made her any happier. She wouldn't be alone. She would have Joker, right there in her apartment. She was in for a second round of nosebleed, with the force she used to lift him off the ground and twirl him around and put him down and hug him. It was with a rag under her nose that she hugged Lawrence, Emma, Jack, Poney, everyone else, and especially Bob Seger. He picked her up like she had Joker and twirled her around, pressed a big kiss on her forehead and handed her a beer to welcome her back home and to the club.

-Prospect.

-What?

-Prospect!

-Prospect?

Robert had a nod and a wide smile, it made her scream and hug him again, she had made it! Prospect! The first ever female prospect of the Sons of Anarchy! She was going to get drunk!

* * *

The party had died down, there was a handful of people left, some shagging on the floor and the bedrooms, some other still playing beer pong, the heat had stopped, the night was pretty cool, and Everett was sitting with a beer on the deck's swing, looking at the quiet city below. After a long moment alone enjoying the breeze, Joker came outside, groaned old people's noises as he sat down on the swing, that swung backwards under his weight.

-Came a long ways, huh?

-Long ways. Rain had to die for me to get a prospect patch?

-That's your thoughts, right now?

-He should be here.

-I know, Everett. I know. But that is life, and this is now. You're a year away from being a member. We all voted two days before your release, and Bobby picked the long straw to tell you.

-I'm grateful, I really am, don't get me wrong. It's bitter sweet. I didn't want to do it alone.

-What am I, gobshite?

-You're using it wrong.

-Fuck off.

Everett had a short chuckle, before moving in the swing chair and leaning against Joker. He watches her, moves his arm to cradle her under his arm, and gives a swift kiss on the top of her head.

-You got me, Lowman. I thought I was your best friend?

-I got you. At least. I'm glad you're here, Phil. You're gonna help me? Find where Rain is buried?

-Leave it, Law has Juicy-boy on the matter. As soon as he'll know, we'll know.

Everett has a nod, as she makes herself comfortable against his side despite the still-relative heat, she would need to stop worrying about the past. She was a prospect, now. It was what she had wanted. Ok, it had been taking nearly three years, and she was in for a shitty year of hazing and bitch work, but she had made it. Losique had most likely lobbied for her in his own strange ways. For that she could only be happy. No more strange freedom, or relative freedom or almost freedom. She was back with her family, and she was there to stay.


	19. Bets and bullets

**Ok, so first off, most of this chapter was written on a tablet as I was hiding from my family in the bathroom for a bit of peace. I proofread several times, but there might still be some spelling mistakes or typing errors. And the other half was written on the PC, but while I was typing it, they were tearing down the house next door, and each time that huge 10 ton excavator would spin around near my window, I had a mini heart attack. So the second half is no better proofread LOL!**

 **Thank you, SamanthaMarie0930 for the review! I'm glad you like it. And I don't know why no one reviews. Maybe they are shy?**

 **As always, I don't own Kurt Sutter's stuff, and he doesn't own mine. Happy reading, and leave a review! Do it! Do it! I suffered a lot for this chapter!**

* * *

"We're ridiculous."

A long silence.

"You're ridiculous. I'm prudent."

Another long silence.

"Oh, go fuck yourself, will you?"

* * *

A bet on a football game, and Everett had lost. Proof that she should keep her bets in the realms of soccer and basketball, she knew nothing, not even the first thing about American football. Jack and Joker had nagged, taunted and teased until she took their stupid bet, and Jack had put the ultimate prize up for grabs. Cross-dressing. He's been so sure of himself. So she had bet for the Cincinnati Bengals to win, and they had let her down.

Emma had been the designer of her outfit. A tight fitting, mid-thighs dark purple dress with knee high leather boots, hair and makeup done, earrings, Everett had to suffer through getting her ears pierced. And she hadn't been allowed her normal leather jacket that may have hidden the dress. Nope, she was made to try and move in ways she wasn't used to move or else people would see up or down her dress, walk in ways she had never walked, and not touch her face or else she would probably smudge the four inches of products that was on there.

Sure, it was all meant in good-natured fun, but she had to go on the whole day like that. She was already cranky from the lack of sleep she was getting, and the shit she was getting as a prospect for the Sons. She really could have done without loosing that bet and having to wear that ridiculous outfit all day.

It hadn't even been the worst of it. Not by a long shot. Riding a motorcycle in such a getup had been painful. Running protection like that, no one really took her seriously. She would never take a bet anymore, sons of bitches.

Then, a venture on the outskirts of another club's territory, disputed strip of land that mostly acted as a tampon between the two gangs. There was an electronics store that was supposed to pay up and hadn't. So Everett and Joker had went, to find the shop empty, and as they were deciding the course of action, they had seen their retreat cut off by a handful of rival MC members that had arrived and parked their bikes at the diner across the street.

It was Everett that had reacted first, as best as she could in her dress, crouched down against an empty display of cellphones, gun in hand, Joker had done the same across the aisle from her. They had held their breath for a while in the hopes of not being discovered.

-This is like a Mexican stand off, but without the Mexicans.

-We're ridiculous.

Joker smiled, looked down at himself, then at her purple dress and high heel boots, she had to have a leg stretched out ahead of her to keep her balance and keep the good stuff covered.

-You're ridiculous. I'm prudent.

She slowly turned her head his way, eyes winced and looking like she could reach across and smack him in the gut, it made him laugh quietly as she deadpanned.

-Oh, go fuck yourself, will you?

Joker had tears rolling down his cheeks from his efforts at keeping his laughter under control. In the entire duration of their friendship, they both doubted about the existence of a more ridiculous situation than the one they were currently in. After forever, the rival MC departed from their lunch, Everett groaned a whole lot as she pulled herself back upright, and on their way to the front door, bitched under her breath at these stupid bets and having to ride a motorcycle like this.

-Leggings were invented for a mother fucking reason, you know? Not just for their fucking transparency and camel-toe proprieties.

Joker was clearly having the time of his life, almost rolling on the floor in laughter as she scanned both sides of the street for any signs of trouble. Two on two, two on three, four, maybe even five, they could have taken. Two against ten, not so much. Finally, he calmed down as she pulled the door, put his arms around her shoulders, stifling his giggles.

-Ok, you've been sport enough.

-Yeah, right.

-Yeah, yeah. Let's go back to your place, so you can change. Let's hurry, before your father sees you.

He was still laughing, the whole ride, all the way to her place, where he waited downstairs while she went up and changed into her regular skinnies, t-shirt with no bra, black socks, riding boots and her kutte above her leather jacket, it was far too cold, for summer. She took advantage of the moment to clean the cat litter and have a leak, drink half an energy drink and as she locked the door to their apartment, she considered going back in anf finding means of wasting time, just to keep the fucker waiting.

In the lobby, her father was mopping the linoleum, she noticed he had been growing his hair, lately, it was almost an inch long, and his elbows looked good. Not banged up, not swollen, not red.

-You're heading back out?

-I am, why?

-Pick your mom some cigarettes? She asked me, but I ain't walking.

-Yeah, of course. Anything else?

-Beer?

-That's just down the street...

He shot her that look, trying to hide his smirk, held up the mop and spoke up.

-You mom said I'm not allowed to pick anything heavier than this mop.

-Or her cigarettes.

-Or her cigarettes.

-Poor thing. I'll get your beer. Miserable sucker.

His eyes lit up, briefly, he did that, sometimes, she had no clue why. She'd just say stuff, and he'd have that look on his face, it almost looked like nostalgia, but not quite. So she took his money and headed outside, Joker was waiting, sitting on his bike, he had a wolf whistle as she came out.

-Now that's the Lowman we all know and love.

-I got to bring my mom some smokes at the Pirate Headquarters.

-Of course. I like your mom, she's fun.

-Everett Lowman?

Everett looked beyond Joker, behind his motorcycle was standing an Asian looking man, nationality, Everett could not have told, they all look the same to her. He was short, impeccably dressed with a suit and tie, she knew what that meant. If she said yes, she would be served some paperwork. A summons, maybe?

-Not fucking happening, pal. Walk away.

There was something unnerving about him, he had the coolest nod ever, as if he understood she had read right through him, he motioned to turn around, only to unholster a gun and point it towards Everett.

Everything went into slow motion. Even the yelp of warning to her friend that had his back on the Asian man. "Gun!", it had already been fired once, and a bullet lodged into Everett's left shoulder, right in the tender part. Joker bounced from his bike, unholstering his gun, and lunged towards the Asian who fired six more rounds, Everett started towards, it had happened so fast, her own gun in hand, she shot the bastard in the head, carefully avoiding Joker's head to shoot the fucker straight between the eyes.

When the sound came back for Everett, she was sitting against the building. her shoulder was numb. She looked around herself. To her left was the door to the apartment building her parents owned. Her father was talking to the cops, he had a CD in his hand, most likely the video surveillance of the building, it was decked with cameras to the nines. He did not fuck around with their security.

There was a paramedic coming her way with a case of medical supplies in his hand. She ignored him, and crawled towards Joker, he was on the ground beside his motorcycle, bleeding profusely from his abdomen, and being tended to, there were cops everywhere. She ignored her own pain to grab his hand, he was searching a familiar face in the crowd above him. They had cut his shirt and pulled it apart, and he had four sluggers in his torso. Two in the lower abdomen, one in the shoulder and one too close to his heart to mean any good.

-Phil? Phil? Hey, Phil.

-Hey. Ev-Ev-Evie.

He was shaking. He was cold, like this. She wished to have the presence of mind to yell at someone to cover him up. She assessed him, them, herself, before deciding to lie to him.

-You're gonna be ok, man. You're gonna be fine.

-Arh, bullshit, love. I was a medic in the army, remember?

-Huh, yeah?

He pulls her closer, to have his mouth by her ear, and whispers a few sentences with the energy he has left, before letting her pull away.

-Promise, Lowman.

-I promise I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna, ok? You don't even worry.

He smiles weakly, still holding her hand before seeing her shoulder.

-Shit, I should have taken that one, for you, too.

-Fuck off. I'm a Lowman, I barely even felt it.

-Go away, Evie. Let me be cold in peace.

She did not want him to die alone, but she would respect his wishes. She tried smiling, before leaning down and pressing her lips against his softly, "Bon voyage" she whispered before pulling away from him, weakly pulling herself off from the sidewalk and upwards, she locked eyes with her father, who was now alone, he was done talking to the cops. Was she going to be arrested? The question must have read in her eyes, because her father shook his head. She had to talk to a cop, give her version of the event, sign a statement and whatnot, but she wouldn't get arrested. She would also have to get checked out by an EMT, make sure the bullet she took was just a flesh wound.

Everett was getting checked out, sitting on a stretcher at the back of an ambulance when they finally loaded Joker up in another, the Lowmans had a telling look for one another, they both knew the man. He was tough, really tough, but not invincible or immortal. He wouldn't survive this one. There was no way.

-You're going to Dudelange?

She bit her lip, answered her father with a nod. No one but them and Joker knew about Dudelange. Everett had been three times, so far, and she knew no one would reach out to Kikka, because no one knew she was there, living under the Lefort name. No one knew she existed in Joker's life.

Oh, Lord, and his three children...

* * *

She had went upstairs, like he had asked, and from his bedroom, she had retrieved his safe. It was just a box with a four digit combination, cracking it would have taken two hours, tops, but instead she put it in a backpack, along with all of his more personal belongings, jewelry and anything else Kikka could have wanted, before heading back down, her shoulder was very tender, but downstairs, nothing remained of last night's shooting. It was on Joker's motorcycle that she sat, putting her sunglasses, she started it, before heading north all alone. She hadn't asked for this time off, Law surely would be pissed, but right now, there were more important things. And Everett knew her father would have her back. Lawrence Moreau wouldn't know about Philippe Lefort's double life in Dudelange.

It was evening time, when she reached Belgium, she had taken her kutte off while waiting in line to cross the border, and put it in the saddle bag, right on top of Phil's belongings, crossed without a hitch, and was in Dudelange in less than half an hour. The house was unchanged from the last time. As she parked the motorcycle in front of the house, where Phil always parked, the door opened, the kids inside had recognized it's rumbling.

Everett had hoped and wished all along that she would reach Belgium late enough that the three kids would be in bed.

She removed her helmet, as the kids kind of froze in the middle of the lawn. Kikka reached the door, shouting something in German for someone inside, holding her baby, she stopped in her tracks as well when she saw Everett instead of Phil on the motorcycle.

-Es tut mir leid, Kikka. I'm sorry.

Everett had expected hysteria. Frantic panicking. Kikka to be absolutely bat shit mad at her. Instead, the taller, older woman had packed up anything that could carry, while telling Everett of the contingencies in place with Happy, back when they had first started coming to Dudelange. Should Joker die before he hung his boots, they were to be taken to Portugal. There was a house, protection and anonymity waiting for them there, under the form of some of Lefort's family. Kikka and her three children would be taken care of. She had even been told to learn to speak Portuguese because it was the retirement plan. Of course, her father had told her none of that, last night when she planned this trip to Dudelange.

-I'll take you there, Kikka. You know Phil trusted me to. But I'll need you to trust me, and my family, to get you there. Cause right now, all you have is the house, car and motorcycle of a dead man.

Kikka paused from her frantic packing of her baby's belongings, Everett inappropriately marveled for a moment of how beautiful she was, with her curly blond hair and her big, expressive green eyes, no wonder Phil was totally under her thumb. They studied each other for a moment, before Kikka had a slow nod, when she spoke up, she was finally choked up, as Everett thought she should have been the moment she had understood Phil was dead. But Everett got it. She really understood. Kikka had been running all of her life. Hiding and being quiet. And for the past twenty years, just waiting for more bad news like this one. She'd long braced herself for it. She would mourn once she got her three children to safety.

-I trust you, Everett Lowman. You are good friend. You help us. You, and you're family.

Everett managed a smile, even if she had no clue where to begin in that task. She would get the Leforts to safety, no matter the cost.


	20. Chapter 20

**Shortest chapter to date, a day late because deal with it, I've been busy. I promise a super-chapter for tomorrow, tough. It's going to be much better. All SOA things belong to Kurt, blah, blah.**

* * *

Getting Kikka and her children in Portugal had been fairly easy, once Everett had convinced the woman to travel alone. It had been part of Joker's contingencies, the plan revised yearly and kept hidden in that gray, number protected safe. As if Joker had known in advance that Everett would enroll her entire family to put a plan in motion, he had left his own instructions.

Happy was to travel with Kikka as husband and wife. There was a fake passport for Kikka under the Lowman name. At least and unlike Everett, Philippe had figured out how to smuggle the three kids out of Belgium. Three passports under the Lowman name, with a Lowman listed as a mother. Everett had enrolled Maddie to take the youngest of the three children, who was only two years old, because Everett certainly could not feel motherly under pressure. And Everett was going to travel with the older kids, aged eight and six. She didn't know what Maddie had planned to do but herself was planning a road trip from hell.

At least, Kikka had spoken to her kids longly, telling them that whenever they reached a checkpoint, they had to talk to Everett like they spoke to her, as if she was their mother. People had to think that they were a family, and they could not raise suspicions. She would already be in Portugal waiting for them. And Everett and Happy were the only Sons that would ever go against their brothers to keep their little family safe. The kids had agreed to anything, as long as their mom was at the other end of the road.

There was going to be a bunch of mileage put on Sailor's SUV, but Everett and Maddie's mom was going to cover for them at the club, Maddie had been hired a while ago by Emma to work at the pawn shop. Sailor had invented a dead relative of the Lowmans in California, to explain all three being missing from Marseilles, but her still being there. She was going to cover three of Maddie's shifts at the pawn shop.

The best thing about Sailor's SUV was definitely the movie screens with headphones at the back of the front seats. They were seldom ever used anymore, Florence considered herself way too cool and popular to be seen with her mother anymore, and the second youngest of the family, King, was off to college, now. Philippe's two oldest kids were thrilled with such "advanced" technology, they had never seen that before. That kept them quiet for most of the road crossing France, they only asked for snacks and bathroom breaks, and they smiled pretty, calling her mommy whenever they crossed checkpoint, or when a cop stopped by to check on them when Everett ended up with a flat tire, near Bordeaux. She was stopping for the night in Arcachon, anyways.

Then the second day, she crossed the Spanish border, and headed to the Northernmost border between Spain and Portugal, and she waited for Happy's text message. The plan was to cross to border as close in time as possible, before the computer system caught on that Portugal was basically invaded by German looking and sounding Lowmans. That was pretty much a piece of cake, and it wasn't too long that both families were reunited at Alexandrine Lefort's house, she was a few yeas older than Everett, "Joker's teenage-hood mistake" she joked as she served everyone dinner in her beautiful villa by the ocean, she was married to someone well off, and taking care of Kikka and her three half-siblings wouldn't be a problem. Her father had been sending her money for a long time, to make up for not raising her and never being there.

Kikka seemed really glad to be back in a country with no Sons. There was a beautiful guest house in the yard for her kids, herself had some money left by Philippe as well, and the house and car and bike in Dudelange had been willed to Happy, for him to liquidate and send the money in Portugal.

Kikka held Everett and Happy for a long while, before letting them go back to France. She was so grateful for them always being there to protect their family and its secrets. It would have never crossed their minds to use that as blackmail against Joker, or as information for the club. As they left, Happy promised the money from the house, he would send it as soon as he had it. Kikka could establish herself there. And Alexandrine would take care of them.

The drive back between her and her dad in Sailor's SUV was all but quiet. Happy was livid at the stupid bylaws that made it impossible to care for his best friend's widow himself. Because that was how Happy felt. Joker had taken bullets for Happy's daughter, well, Happy would have taken care of his family as well. Not just leave them with a stranger in a strange land, even if said stranger was a Lefort by name. But no. One asshole in Munich had decided that Kikka was club property, now she had to spend the rest of her life hidden, because there was nothing else Happy and Everett could do for her without going against the club.

At least the club was now slowly catching up to the fully modernized Charming charter, with Everett as a prospect. Charming still had no female members or prospects, but that was due to the lack of desires from women around Charming to join a motorcycle club composed entirely of men. Everett had grown around them for almost twenty years, none of their antics or behaviors could be enough to scare her away. She wanted it now more than ever, to avenge Randy, and Philippe. She would find the asshole that had taken their lives, not just the executioners, but the ones that had given the order, and she would torture them, she would go medieval on their asses like one would not believe.


End file.
